In Love, Actually
by monique42
Summary: FutureFic.Focuses mainly on Chris and Wyatt. The Halliwells are busy with weddings, babies and protecting the book from a new threat and dating has become complicated for the teenage Halliwells. Little do they know that they are being watched...
1. Graduation

In Love, Actually.

**A/N**: So here's the deal, if you read Back to the Past, you can skip this author's note and get to the good stuff. On the off chance there are new readers well you don't need to know much. I'm planning on re-introducing the characters as I go along and generally summing it up but if you think it would help go read BttP, or at least just the epilogue, that will probably sum most things up.

But hopefully if you can't be bothered it should affect you too much. If you have any questions or anything that is unclear just ask and I won't hesitate to clarify it for you.

Oh but you should probably know this quick little family background, just in case it isn't all that clear as I go along.

1st of all this is the good future where Wyatt isn't evil, that's kind of an important one. But instead, in a cruel twist of fate (for Chris and Patricia) he became the good one who is an excellent student and rarely gets into trouble.

Patricia is Wyatt and Chris' little sister who is about 14, who like Chris seems to have a flair for encouraging her parents to ground her at regular intervals.

Phoebe is married to Jason which whom they have 1 daughter, Polly, 11.

Paige's boyfriend Adam is also a witch and they have a daughter Petulia, 12.

Katie is Chris' best friend but has recently started going out with Wyatt much to Chris' discomfort.

As I've said if you need anything cleared up just ask.

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**Chapter 1: Graduation**

"Wyatt Matthew Halliwell, get your graduating ass down the stairs this instant!" yelled Piper Halliwell.

"No!" came the muffled reply from upstairs.

"Piper, sweetie, you've been yelling at him for ten minutes," said Phoebe. "I don't think he's coming down. I think he can sense the cameras."

"Oh he's coming down alright," said Piper determinedly."We worked so hard to get to today, making reservations, managing to get Chris to wear a tie, vanquishing all the demons that could possibly attack . . ."

"Ssh!" said Paige. "They'll hear you and come and ruin the day!"

"In fact, that's probably them now," said Chris, going over to the door, glad of the distraction.

He opened the door to find his best friend Katie standing there all dressed up.

"Hey," she said giving him a quick hug before walking on in to the hallway.

"Hey yourself," he said closing the door behind her.

"Hi Katie," said Phoebe, giving her a little wave.

"So where's the man of the hour?" asked Katie looking about for Wyatt.

"Cowering in his room," said Patricia, coming down the stairs. "And refusing to come out. Sorry mom I tried."

"It's ok sweetie," said Piper, through gritted teeth.

"Chris, should we be worried that the vein in your mom's head is throbbing like that?" Katie whispered to Chris.

"Oh, no happens all the time when she's intensely angered or irritated. It may be the first time Wyatt has ever provoked 'the vein' before though," said Chris.

"He's just being stubborn and refusing to leave his room in that ridiculous graduation gown. Like we care!" said Patricia, walking over to them. "I swear my brother can be such an idiot at times," she said. "And Wyatt isn't exactly being Mr. Rational right now either," she said grinning at Chris.

"Hey!" he protested. "I'm not an idiot."

"That's it!" said Piper, who was by now tapping her foot impatiently. "Wyatt if you are not in this hall within the next thirty seconds I swear to God I will ban you from ever leaving this house ever again."

"But I look like an dork!" whined Wyatt, who had now made it out of his room and onto the landing.

"No change there then," said Chris.

"Hey!" said Katie, swatting Chris with the back of her hand. "His girlfriend, standing right here! And I'll have you know that I happen to think he's one very cute dork."

"Well I always have said you needed glasses," said Chris who was rewarded for his comment with a swift dig in the ribs.

"Well the faster you get down here, the quicker we get to the ceremony where you can blend in with all your dorky looking friends. We all had to do it so suck it up and don't make your entire family and your girlfriend, wait on you any longer," said Piper. "We're getting more and more impatient and with every growing second you are not in this hall the chances of you ever seeing daylight again are getting progressively slimmer!"

"Wow she's good," said Katie.

"I know," said Chris and Patricia simultaneously, both with similar looks of contempt. Both had suffered severely at the hand of their mother's disciplinary flair.

"No they're not!" insisted Wyatt. "Most of them don't care! Dad, Jason and Adam are in the living room watching the game and I'm sure my graduation is the most unwanted thing ever right now from the cheers and groans which keep coming from in there. Polly and Petulia, well I don't know where they are but I know they're not in the hall and so don't care."

"They're in the car, which we sent them to twenty minutes ago so if they die from oxygen deprivation you know who we're going vanquish!" said Paige.

"Vanquish?" asked Katie as Phoebe quickly stood on Paige's foot. "Yeah, just a fancy word for kill."

"They're 12 and 11!" said Wyatt. "They're smart enough to know to crank open a window!"

"Wyatt, if you come down now I won't be angry," said Piper in a sweet voice.

Really?"

"Really," assured Piper.

"Are there cameras down there?" asked Wyatt, who sounded like he was getting closer to the top of the stairs

The Charmed Ones all looked at each other and slowly placed the cameras they were all holding in their bags or behind their backs.

"Ok then," said Wyatt coming down the stairs with his arms folded. As soon as he came into view, Patricia let out a large snort of laughter while Chris tried to muffle his laughs by placing his hand over his mouth, even Katie was smiling.

Wyatt automatically turned and started walking back up the stairs. "Hold it there mister," said Piper.

"My little brother and sister are laughing at me!" exclaimed Wyatt.

"Just get down here, sweetie," said Piper, smiling at him.

Wyatt reluctantly descended the stairs and as he passed his Piper, she slapped him round the back of the head.

"But you said. . .!"

"I know what I said now get out of this house before I hit you again," she said.

"Dude, you look, ridiculous," said Chris.

"Shut up," said Wyatt, hitting his brother with his hat.

"Well I think you look adorable," said Katie, going on her tip toes to give him a quick kiss.

"Great that's really the look I was going for," said Wyatt, rolling his eyes as he went out into the driveway.

"Ok, now for the hard part," said Piper, marching into the living room. Her sisters followed suit, knowing she was going to need all the help she could get on this one.

"Ok we finally got all the kids out of the house, so you can all go now," she said to the three men on the sofa, who didn't even so much as look away from the TV screen.

"Ok, ok, after the next inning," said Leo.

"Let me rephrase," said Piper. "Get out of the house now."

"In a minute," whined Adam.

"Try now!" said Phoebe, marching over to the TV and turning it off.

Tutting, Jason lifted the remote and turned it back on.

Paige, waved her hand at it, "Remote," she said as it disappeared in a swirl of blue lights.

"Where'd you put it?" asked Jason.

"Oh somewhere in the Amazonian Rainforest, where it will remain if you don't move," said Paige, rationally.

Suddenly Adam's head drooped and his astral self appeared. Then it dematerialised in soft red lights and when it appeared again, it had the TV remote in it's hand. It then walked over to it's sleeping form and become one with again, turning on the TV.

"Oh no you didn't," said Paige, folding her arms.

"Finally! A use for the progression of astral projection!" said Adam to Jason and Leo.

"Leo Wyatt!" yelled Piper in shock. "It is your eldest son's graduation and you can't even be bothered to remove yourself from the TV!"

"So we'll be a little late," said Leo.

"You did not just say that!" said Piper. "Get of that couch now!"

"But sweetie, it's Giants versus the Marlins!"

"But sweetie, I don't care," said Piper, blowing up the remote with a swift hand gesture. "The TV's next," she warned.

The three men literally got up and sprinted out of the room as Piper dusted of her hands, a certain sense of self satisfaction taking over.

"Nicely handled Piper!" said Phoebe, giving her sister a round of applause, and Paige joined in.

"Yeah, screw the club owning business you should be like a prison warden!" said Paige.

"And on that weird note, let's not be hypocrites and keep everyone back. To the cars, before we're late!" said Piper, ushering them out of the house.

"Oh and Wyatt," said Katie, just as he was about to get into the car. "We lied," she said, quickly raising her camera and taking a picture.

"Give it here!" said Wyatt, as he chased her around the garden.

"Chris!" she yelled throwing the camera over his head and into his brother's hands.

"Chris . . ." warned Wyatt, slowly advancing towards him.

"Say cheese!" said Chris, taking another picture before running round to the other side of the car with the camera, his older brother chasing him. "Chris don't be so immature give it back!" said Wyatt.

"Uh ok," said Chris, stopping, as Patricia came up behind him.

"Really?" said Wyatt.

"Nope," said Chris, braking out in a grin as he passed it to Patricia who took great pleasure of taking another few pictures before scrambling to the other side of the garden.

"Mom! Will you make them stop!" said Wyatt, seeing his mother and aunts leaving the house.

"Aww Wyatt are your little brother and sister picking on you?" asked Piper. "Patricia! Chris! Stop it at once," she said to them sternly. "Give it here," said Piper, gesturing for it.

Patricia reluctantly handed the camera over to her mother, who smiled at took a picture of her son in his graduation robes.

"Mom!" complained Wyatt.

"Oh get over it," said Piper, ruffling his hair. "Now get your ass into the car."

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"I can't believe I actually did it," said Wyatt. "I actually finished high school."

"Yeah neither can I," said Chris. "Then again I think we all did have our doubts, especially towards the end there," he said jokingly.

After the ceremony which they had just about made it in time for, the entire family plus Katie went out to a big fancy restaurant to celebrate.

"Ignore him, we're all very proud of you honey," said Piper.

"Thanks mom," said Wyatt. "It's a little scary that in a few months I'm heading of to college but, onwards and upwards I say."

"Really?" asked Chris. "I say good riddance," he said causing them all to break out a smile and Phoebe to gently swat her nephew on the arm.

"But in all seriousness I'd like to propose a toast," said Chris, raising his glass and looking around the table sincerely. "To Wyatt, for being the first and from looking around this table probably the last Halliwell to graduate with honours since mom. For being accepted into a good college and going of to further his education. Here's to me getting the room to myself!"

They all laughed at Chris' toast and followed it up with a "Here, here."

"Well if you'd care to stop mocking me long enough for me to go to the bathroom I'd much appreciate it," Wyatt told him brother with a smile before getting up and heading for the toilets.

"You know for a second there I thought you were actually going to make a sincere toast," said Katie.

"I _was_ sincere! I meant every word of it," Chris assured her. "I've wanted my own room for years! It's just full of trophies and certificates and sports equipment! It's awful."

"Well you have to say that there have been no further additions since I started dating him," said Katie.

"And for that I am eternally grateful," said Chris. "You Katie Hennessey, are a bad influence. No wonder we are friends."

"Wyatt?"

Wyatt spun round upon hearing his name and smiled when he saw that the voice belonged to his friend Aaron.

"Hey man, what's up?"

"Nothing much, the parents just brought me out a celebratory dinner," said Aaron.

"Same here," said Wyatt. "I mean I said they didn't have to but they insisted, said I'd earned it. I don't think they understood that I just didn't want to go anywhere remotely public dressed like this."

Aaron laughed, "Yeah I know what you mean, seriously if I could find the guy who designed these robes he'd be dead meat."

"Uh I think he died a considerable amount of time ago," said Wyatt.

"Yeah you're probably right," said Aaron. "So I see Katie's here. Is it not weird having her sit with your family, it must be really uncomfortable for her."

"No not at all, I mean her and Chris had been best friends for years before we started going out, so she knows them all pretty well, you know," said Wyatt.

"Do you ever worry about them two?" asked Aaron as Katie gave out a loud laugh at something Chris had said.

"Who?" asked Wyatt turning around, "Chris and Katie? God no, they're just good friends."

"Wow, that's original I've never heard that one before," said Aaron.

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Chris was bored, something that happened very rarely outside of his physic's classroom. Well it wasn't so much that he was bored, but that ever since Wyatt had came back from the bathroom, he had been subjected to listening to Wyatt and Katie talk about coupley things and it was driving him nuts.

Patricia was at the other end of the table, where she had been placed by Piper when a food fight had almost broken out between herself and Chris and although Chris would usually just chat to someone else he couldn't. The sight of Wyatt an, not to mention the queasy feeling it was creating in his stomach.

So excusing himself from the table, he went to the bathroom. He checked that there was no one else there before orbing back to the manor. Upon materialising in the kitchen, he loosened the tie him mother had insisted he wore and threw his jacket to the side.

"Get a hold of yourself man, she's your brother's girlfriend, she's your brother's girlfriend," he mumbled to himself while pouring a glass of water. Just as he was about to start channel surfing, he heard a noise from upstairs. He stopped and listened again, he could definitely hear footsteps . . . and chanting.

Moving quietly, he went into the kitchen and lifted a few exploding potions out of the cupboard. He orbed into the attic to find three demons standing over the book, chanting.

"Surprise!" said Chris throwing to potions at them. Unexpectedly, the glass broke, the potion splattered but nothing happened.

"Uh oh," said Chris. The three demons stopped and two of them began advancing in his direction. He waved his arm and sent them flying across the attic and crashing into the wall.

"Uh Paige!" he yelled calling for his aunt.

"I was worried that I was going to run into the legendary Charmed Ones. Instead I get nothing more than a half whitelighter, a pathetic breed really. You don't have the spirit for the fight in you," said the third demon, who seemed to be the leader.

"Hey! That's half elder, dipshit and my pacifist side isn't exactly thriving," said Chris, looking about the attic.

"Axe," he said with his arms outstretched, calling for the axe he had spotted in the corner. "Lucky for me," he said as he orbed out and then in behind him before swinging the axe and decapitating him, erupting flames. "Not so lucky for you," he told the scorch mark.

"You took your time," said Chris to the blue lights that were appearing in the attic.

"What is the matter?" said Paige, materialising in the attic.

"Demons!" yelled Chris, tossing her the axe as another five demons appeared in the attic as the other two got up.

"I can see that," said Paige, swinging the axe around as they closed in on her and Chris threw them about the attic telekinetically. "But why'd you call me?"

"Cause you can hear me and I didn't want to drag Wyatt away from his graduation party and mom was so insistent that it would be a demon free day that I didn't want to shatter her misguided delusions," said Chris moving one of the demons into Paige's axe.

"Ok, we need to get to the book to find a spell or something," said Paige.

"I've a feeling that is going to be easier said than done," said Chris, as another three demons appeared, surrounding the book and began chanting again.

"Wow, that's getting annoying," said Chris, as he diverted a fireball that was heading towards him with a wave of his hand and sent it back to the demon who had sent it.

"Chris, we are going to need some back up here," said Paige. "We have to stop them and whatever they're doing to the book, but more of these demons keep showing up."

"I know," said Chris reluctantly, as he avoided the sword that was being swung at him. He orbed out just in time before using his telekinesis to trip him up before calling for the sword and using it to vanquish him.

"Patricia!" he yelled at the ceiling. "And bring Aunt Phoebe," he added as an after thought.

"I still hope we can get through this without involving Wyatt or mom," explained Chris.

"Good thinking, Piper is going to blow as gasket when she finds out demons attacked on Wyatt's graduation," said Paige. "Though you know, they are the ones with the most firepower."

"Yeah but they're the last resort," said Chris.

"Woah!"

Chris and Piper turned round upon hearing Patricia's voice and found that the room was frozen.

"So this is what you were up to," said Phoebe. "I was hoping it wasn't demons," she said.

"Yeah well it is and seeing as we all know my freeze doesn't last for very long let's work quickly," said Patricia, looking at the frozen figures about the attic. "So what's the deal with these guys?"

"Don't know," said Chris. "Exploding potions didn't work on them and more of them keep popping up. They seem to be doing some sort of spell on the book."

"Then, quick, grab the book," Phoebe ordered Chris who went over and lifted out of the circle the demons surrounding it had formed.

"Trish, take the book downstairs and find a spell or a potion to get these guys out of here and don't come back until you do," said Paige. "If any of them show up call for us."

"Ok," said Patricia, taking the book of her brother just as the room unfroze. "That's my cue," she said orbing out of the attic and into the kitchen where she frantically began flicking through the pages of the book, looking for demons who matched the ones upstairs. Every time she heard a crash or a yell she fought the instinct to go help out and instead just kept going through the book.

"Hey."

Patricia gave a little yelp upon hearing the voice and squinted before she even saw who it was in the kitchen.

"Oh my God, Adam, I'm so sorry," she said, rushing around to help him of the ground.

"Oh it's ok, this is just my astral form," he said brushing himself off. "Everyone was disappearing so I figured you could use some help. Piper's getting pretty suspicious, she thinks there's demons, not that she said anything, Katie being there and all," he said.

"Well she'd be right," said Patricia going back to the book. "They're up in the attic fighting them right now. They seemed to be after the book so I took it down here and have to figure out a way to get rid of them cause for every one we vanquish another one seems to take it's place," she said trying to catch him up.

"Are you ok here or should I stay and help," he asked.

"Uh, I'm good, go help them," said Patricia.

"Are you sure?" asked Adam. "What if they show up down here looking for the book?"

"I'm a big girl Adam, I can take care of myself," said Patricia. "I've got two active powers plus orbing and I can yell _really_ loud," she added with a smirk. "Go," she insisted.

With that Adam raced for the stairs and Patricia continued to look through the book. "Ah ha!" she exclaimed triumphantly. "Minooki demons, have the ability to . . . oh who cares," she said, scanning on down for the spell to vanquish them.

"Ah crap it's power of three," said Patricia. "I'm going to have to get mom. Ugh she's going to be so pissed," she said orbing out.

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"Patricia, sweetie, there you are, I was wondering where you got to," said Piper. "I don't suppose you've seen your brother or your aunts?" she asked. "Even Adam's disappeared on us!"

"Sorry, no haven't seen them, but mom can I see you over here for a moment," she said.

"What about?"

"Uh, I'm having hair issues, my clips keep coming loose I swear it's like they're **demonic** or something," she said, hoping she'd take the hint.

"Oh," sad Piper, taking her napkin off her lap and placing it on the table.

"You know, I can help you with that," offered Katie.

"No, no Katie, don't worry, I'll go," said Piper, getting up and taking her daughter's hand as they rushed off into the bathroom so they could orb out.

"You're family have a serious habit of going of like that," said Katie. "Including you."

"Yea," said Wyatt, shifting in his chair, listening carefully in case some one called for him. "What can I say, we're flaky like that."

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"Huh, and you didn't call for me why?" asked Piper as she strolled into the attic after freezing the room.

"Uh, hi Piper," said Phoebe, detangling herself from the demon she's been fighting.

"We didn't want to bother you," said Chris, glaring at his little sister.

"Oh, don't look at me like that, it was a power of three spell," said Patricia.

"Yeah can we please say it and get back before Katie gets anymore suspicious?" said Piper, taking her sisters' hands.

"We call upon all the magic throughout time,

To vanquish this evil and with this rhyme

May they cease to exist for all of eternity,

We do this now with the Power of three," they read from the piece of paper Piper had taken from Patricia.

The room unfroze as the demons in the room exploded in flames, leaving nothing but scorch marks and ashes.

"Ok people, let's orb out!" commanded Piper.

"Uh guys?" said Phoebe. "I'm not feeling so well," she said as she began to sway.

Thinking quickly, Chris moved the sofa telekinetically across the attic so Phoebe landed on it.

"I'll go get her some water," said Patricia, leaving the room to head for the kitchen.

"Sweetie, are you ok?" asked Piper with concern, as both her and Paige moved to sit beside their sister.

"Uh I think so," said Phoebe. "I just feel really light headed, and nauseous."

"That's not like you," said Paige, stroking her hair. "Have you done anything out of the ordinary, eaten anything funky?"

"You didn't happen to eat that casserole that was in the fridge did you cause Wyatt made that," said Chris.

"Did you? Cause Chris is right, that'll probably do it," said Piper. "I mean I love my son dearly but he clearly got his culinary skills or lack there of from his father."

"No, nothing!" said Phoebe, putting her head in her hands. "I know better to eat anything Wyatt has been near!"

"Here you go," said Patricia, handing her aunt a glass of ice cold water.

"Thanks honey," said Phoebe, taking it of her.

As they did, they touched fingers and Patricia was pulled into a premonition.

"Oh my God Aunt Phoebe!" she squealed excitedly, "You're pregnant!"

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A/N: Ok, crap opening chapter, I know but I'm one to slowly ease into things such as plot! Besides I couldn't think of any other way to start this story so I figured you'd rather have a bad chapter now than an acceptable one several months later.

Well there you go, please review!


	2. Summer

**In Love, Actually**

**A/N:  **Hey, sorry I know it's been a while but it has just been a mixture of endless computer problems, writers block, some rather important exams and me (although very temporarily) actually getting a life. The only reason this is up is a severe case of procrastination from revision.

I no longer have Microsoft Word and the programme that I am using doesn't have spell check and seeing as I can neither type or spell this is probably going to be a mess. Sorry. Any major errors please let me know and I'll try to sort it out. I went through this like so many times but I'm sure there will still be some mistakes.

Also this isn't that long but I just need to ease myself back into this whole 'updating' thing slowly. Plus not much happens in it, sorry . . . again. (looks down at feet, ashamed)

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**Chapter 2: Summer**

Patricia Halliwell entered the manor early one summer afternoon. She had been round at a friend's house but had left early when her friend felt sick. "Mom, I'm home!" she yelled as she closed the door behind her, she could hear some of Piper's music coming from upstairs. She stopped in her place, something was wrong, she could feel it in the air. Wait, no she could smell it. The panic swept through her as she recognised the distinct smell of disinfectant and she marched towards a few boxes that were lying at the foot of the stairs marked 'Charity Shop.' She plunged into the box, rumaging around with gasps of horror.

She quickly orbed out and straight to Magic School. "Hey Trish," said Chris looking up from one of his books.

"Help! I need reinforcements!" she yelled, panic stricken.

At once Chris was on his feet, ready for action. "What is it? Demons?"

"Worse," said Patricia, shaking her head, almost in disbelief that it was this time of year once again. "Mom's doing summer clearout!"

"What!" exclaimed Chris in panic. "No, surely it can't be . . ."

"Well it is, now hurry up!" said Patricia, tugging his arm earnestly.

"Shouldn't we warn Aunt Paige?"

"We don't have time, our precious junk is on the line!" she said, the hysteria growing in her voice before she orbed out and Chris quickly followed.

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Piper stopped what she was doing when she heard bags being torn open and outraged screams coming from the attic. "Oh brother," she mumbled to herself as she headed up to the attic, prepared for a fight. "Stop what your doing!" she said as she practically slided into the room. "Do you have any idea how long it took me to organise these?"

"Oh I'm so sorry we are interrupting you as you throw away our memories," said Chris, who was busy removing several items from the formerly perfectly organised and labeled boxes.

"Mooney!" exclaimed Patricia as she produced a moth-eaten teddy bear from a box and lovingly attended to its wounds. "I can't believe you were going to throw this away! Why would you do this to me? Did you really think I wouldn't notice?" she demanded.

"Well seeing as it has been at the bottom of your wardrobe for the past seven years, I'm going to have to go with yes, yes I did," said Piper.

"It was so not seven years!" said Patricia. Piper raised an eyebrow at her daughter. "Fine, but six and a half tops," she insisted. "The point is I love him and am NEVER giving him away," she said, kissing the teddy's forehead before giving her mother a meaningful glare.

"Hey! This is my favourite shirt!" he said pulling out a top from the box at his feet.

"Chris you haven't worn that it years!" reasoned Piper.

"Only because I grew out of it," he said rationally, as he held it close to him, fondly, before tying it around his waist.

"You see this is what I am talking about," said Piper, growing increasingly frustrated. "You guys don't need this stuff! You haven't even looked at it in years! I just thought it would be better off going to some unfortunate kids who could find a use for it."

"Don't try to guilt trip us," said Patricia. "We are _so_ beyond that."

"Plus we need the extra room with the new baby on the way and everything," said Piper. "There are only so many anti-claustraphobic spells we can cast before we evoke personal gain."

"Where is Pheebs?" asked Chris. "I doubt she's approve of this," he said, going over to another bag to tear it open.

"Chris . . ." pleaded Piper.

"Paige!" called Chris in horror as the contents of the bag spilled out on to the attic floor. "What is it?" came Paige's voice out of the soft white and blue lights that appeared in the attic. Chris could only point to the destruction in front of him, and Piper winced as her sister took a sharp inhale of breath, shock and and horror evident. "My Metallica cds!" she yelled, running over to them and scooping them up in her arms, holding them close to her. "Just what the hell do you think you are playing at?" she asked Piper angrily.

"Giving your stuff away to charity," said Piper with a defeated sigh.

"Why? Aren't poor people bitter and angry enough without listening to metal music?"

"If they make you angry why do _you_ listen to them when you fight demons every day?"

"Cause they rock!" proclaimed Paige. "I can't believe you would do this! How many times Piper, we are not throwing out our stuff. We like our junk, it makes us feel all warm and safe inside. You did the right thing calling me," she told Chris. "Now just what else of mine were you trying ship off?" she asked opening the box. She frowned, confused. It was full of notebooks. Lifting one out, she began flicking through it before she started laughing.

"Oh, I need to sit down," she said as she continued whooping with laughter. "You guys so need to see this," she said, offering the tattered notebook to Chris as she sat back trying to ease the pain in her stomach caused by her insistent laughing, as she wiped the tears from her eyes. Patricia walked over to Chris as he opened the notebook and read it with him. Like Paige before them, they both began laughing uncontrollably. "This may be the happiest moment of my life," said Chris, who was shaking with laughter. "Ah at least top three anyway," said Patricia who was in a similar state. "Oh God and look, there are more," she said pointing to the box full of them.

"No!" said Chris sitting down beside Paige. "I don't think I could take it!"

"Give me that," said Piper, taking the notebook off Chris. "You cannot tell Wyatt I let you find these."

"Are you kidding me?" said Chris. "This is too sweet to keep to myself!"

"I mean it Chris!" warned Piper. "He was embarassed enough when I found them a couple of years back! He doesn't even write them anymore, I think, and he made me swear I wouldn't tell." She sighed, seeing she wasn't getting through to them. "I'll tell you what, I'll make you a deal. You three don't say anything to Wyatt or anyone else for that matter and I'll let you keep one box worth of stuff each."

"Three," said Patricia.

Piper considered this for a moment, "Two," she said. "Final offer."

Chris, Patricia, and Paige started mumbling to each other animatedly. Finally the whispering stopped and Paige got up and walked over to her sister, her hand extended out, "Deal," she said shaking her hand. "Now if you'll excuse us we have some picking and choosing to do," she said picking up an empty box to fill with the junk she wanted to keep. "Oh but Piper? You ever touch any of my metal cds again and I'll orb you somewhere even Leo won't find you."

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"Hey Pheebs, how'd the doctors appointment go?" asked Piper as her sister and Jason walked through the door.

"Great! She says everything is as it should be, I'm fourteen weeks along, my due date is January the 19th, _and_ . . ." said Phoebe, pausing for emphasis as Jason put his arm around her tightly. "We're having a girl!" she said excitedly.

"Phoebe, honey, we already knew that," said Piper.

"We thought Wyatt was a girl," said Phoebe, frowning that Piper wasn't more excited about her news.

"Yeah but that was the only gender surprise this family has ever had," said Piper. "I mean Chris came and told us he was a boy and Trish, well that was a little unexpected to be fair, I did think another boy was on the cards. But the point is it's only my freaky genes that result in boys!"

"FIne, fine," said Phoebe. "But still, you could have been just an ickle bit excited," she said pouting.

"Oh sweetie of course I'm excited!" said Piper, hugging her sister. "You're having a baby, that's very exciting!"

"It is, isn't it?" she said inanely grinning.

"Of course it is," said Jason, kissing her on the top of the head. "I've gotta go into the office, I have a meeting in an hour. I'll see you for dinner?"

"Ok," said Phoebe contently, sitting down on the sofa, admiring her slightly protruding belly. "Where is everyone? The house is quiet, it's strange. I like it!"

She had barely finished speaking when two demons shimmered into the room. She let out a yell as she lept onto her feet and levitated into the air to avoid a fireball. "You couldn't keep your big yap shut, could you?" said Piper as she swiftly blew up the two demons. "Sorry," said Phoebe, apologetically as she returned to the ground. "Ugh these attacks are getting worse! What is going on? That is like the third one this week! And it's only Tuesday!"

"I know, we should probably check that the book is ok," said Piper, frowning in worry. "That seems to be the main target recently. I think we should set up the crystals around it."

"Good idea," said Phoebe, following her sister to the attic. "What's really confusing me is that it's not the one group of demons. Usually when someone is coming after the book it is a particular clan who think they will try their luck and take us on but each attack is from a different set of demons."

"Coincidence?" asked Piper hopefully.

"I don't see how," said Phoebe. "What are the chances that fifty or so different types of demons all decided to come after the Book of Shadows at the same time?"

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"This is getting beyond pathetic!" growled Kuran Hirn, ruler of the Filarka demons as he paced back and forth in front of a line of his soldiers. "More and more clans are making their attempt on the Halliwell Book of Shadows and we are yet to come up with a plan! We are falling behind! Eventually some other demons are going to get the book and we'll still be here, waiting on a decent suggestion!"

"In all respect, sir, from what I hear no other demon has got anywhere near succeeding," said one.

"It's only a matter of time," Kuran assured them through gritted teeth.

"Well I don't hear you coming up with any plans," muttered one Filarkan. With a point of his finger, Kuran sent the demon on fire, and he promptly became a pile of dust. "Clean that up, won't you?"

Just then five Brunghad demons flamed in to the cave. "Hold your fire!" the leader cried out as the Filarkan's hands were alite with fireballs floating above their palms.

"Why, exactly?" asked Kuran.

"We want the book as much as every other demon in the underworld at the moment but like you we're deicded to bide our time. We recognise your clan as one of the stronger ones."

"So?"

"I wish to propose a partnership."

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"Call me crazy but that one sorta looks like a lampost wearing a fez."

"Ok crazy," said Wyatt with a grin.

"Oh so sorry Mr. 'That cloud looks like a smull cluster of blackberries in a conical flask,'" retorted Tom moodily, before coughing the word 'geek.' "Oh for the days we were able to lie out in the sun in peace, making fun of you, actually. Just the **four** of us," he said meaningfully, but his eyes dancing with mischief.

"Boys, boys, play nice," said Katie lazily, sprawled out on the grass.

Her, Wyatt, Chris, Tom and Benji had been lying in the park for the past couple of hours, cloud gazing, taking photos of various stupid faces they were pulling and participating in idle chat.

"I always play nice," said Chris. "Except when partaking in any type of game that results in a winner. Then it's war."

"Oh in that case," said Katie, getting into a kneeling position, and producing an open bottle of water, "It's war," as she threw water over an unsuspecting Chris. She got up and began running away, laughing at the sight of water dripping down Chris' nose as he got up and chased after her, armed with a much larger bottle."There they go again," said Tom, clearly amused while Benji took photographs with Katie's camera as Chris tackled her to the ground and pinned her down. Ignoring her screams of protest he opened the bottle and emptied the entire container over her.

"They do seem to do this a lot, don't they?" said Wyatt, equally amused.

"Always have," said Benji, still snapping away. "Not that we're much more mature mind you. But those two are so much worse."

"Yeah I can just imagine them when they are like ninety chasing each other around the nursing home with their canes, and throwing their prune juice over each other," said Tom, half laughing.

"You little shit," said Katie as she sat up, soaking wet. "Well you were the one who delcared war," he said, grinning as he offered her a hand up.

"No I'm too wet to walk!" she insisted in a whiny tone.

Chris laughed, "Well in that case, madame, hop aboard the Halliwell Express," he said offering her a piggy-back ride. She giggled as she clambered onto his back, her legs wrapped around his waist and her arms tightly around his neck. "Thank you monsieur, awfully kind of you!"

"Ugh you are soaking my back," complained Chris as he carried her over to the others. "Serves you right," she said as she climbed off and stuck out her tounge at him before they both collapsed to the ground.

"Well I'd say that round went to Christabella," said Benji.

Chris suddenly sat up, sure that his ears had been disceiving him, but one look at his brother, who was red in the face from trying not to laugh told him otherwise. "I can't believe you told them," he said, shaking his head in shock.

"It slipped out," said Wyatt, as innocently as he could muster.

"Childhood nicknames from kindergarten don't just 'slip out,'" he said angrily. "The fact that there are several notebooks in the house filled with poerty, all Wyatt Halliwell originals, however, simply rolls of one's tounge without any pre-meditation."

Katie, Tom and Benji, all sat in shock as Wyatt went as pale as a ghost and they began laughing as they thought about this revelation. "How'd you find out?" asked Wyatt, quietly."Not that it's true or anything," he said defensively to the laughing figures rolling about on the ground. "Mum had them in a box in the attack,"said Chris. "Oh glorious day, I look upon thee, with all the warmth of a hot summer noon!" he began in a mock arrogant voice as his brother made a dive for him. "I'm going to hurt you for this!" he yelled as he ran after Chris, who was still reciting. "The wind rustles the leaves like a mother, gently carressing her baby's soft, delicate cheek!"

"It's funny cause you have to kiss him!" said Tom between laughs, earning himself a dig in the ribs from Katie.

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"I had fun today," said Katie, as her and Wyatt walked hand in hand to her house.

"Huh!" said Wyatt. "I'm sure you did, and at my expense!"

"Perhaps," said Katie, smiling. "Serves you right for unearthing one of Chris' embarassing secerets. So tell me, W.M. Halliwell, how come you haven't wrote any love poems for me?" she asked, enjoying watching him wince.

"I don't write poetry anymore. It was just something I did when I was fourteen after Mrs. Millar told me I was the best English student she'd seen in years and I got a little full of myself and decided I was going to become a famous poet."

"You still are full of yourself," Katie informed him.

"Yeah but in an adorable way," said Wyatt, flashing her his puppy dog eyes. She laughed and leaned in closer to him as they walked along, "Well I can't deny that, it must be a genetic trait or something."

"Probably."

"I'm going to miss us when you go off to college in September," said Katie, snugggling into him.

"You don't have to," said Wyatt.

"I know, I know," she said. "We'll have holidays and the occasional weekend but you can't deny that it won't be the same."

"It could be," said Wyatt.

"How?"

"I could stay at home and go to a San Franciscan College."

"What?" exclaimed Katie, pulling out of the embrace and stopping in her place, dropping his hand.

"I could go to GGU, they do the course that I want and I wouldn't have to move away."

"But ever since we started dating it has been 'USC this' and 'USC that!' You said that you really wanted to go to college in LA!" said Katie.

"Why are you so mad? I thought you'd be happy that I wanted to stay for you!" said Wyatt, confused.

"That's exactly why I'm mad!" said Katie frustrated. "You have nothing else keeping you here! If it wasn't for me you wouldn't even be considering staying in San Francisco! GGU wasn't even on your radar!"

"People change their mind all the time!" argued Wyatt.

"Not about their dream college they don't! And even if they do, they sure as hell don't do it over a sixteen year old sarcastic, cynical girl! I don't want you to compromise your future over me! I couldn't do that! You deserve so much more!"

"But Katie . . ."

"And knowing the amount of times we break up each month, it's not the world's most stable relationship is it? I mean being realistic if this didn't work out and you were stuck here you'd resent me for the rest of your life! I just couldn't let you do that!"

"Kate . . ."

"And if you don't get that then you don't know me at all," she said sadly, before turning and walking away from him, running her hand through her hair in frustration.

"Shit," muttered Wyatt as he watched her go. 'I'm so going to have to write her the fricken love poem.'

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A/N: Well that sure as hell wasn't worth waiting for! The problem is that I know in great detail what's goin to happen in a couple of chapters and after that but getting it there is driving me nuts! I'm really tempted just to skip the next few chapters but I just don't think it will work! The clearout thing happened to me last week and my friends found it really funny when I retold the story back to them (sadistic so and so's!) so I thought I'd throw it into the mix in an attempt to inject some humour! Hope it worked!

Now on to the reviews.I can't believe I got so many for one chapter! It made me really guilty! From now on I'm just goin to reply to reviews that ask questions or say sometin I feel the need to comment on and just thank everybody else. (Exams have made me lazy like that.)

So thanks to **Kalena**, **ChiaraStorm, Buffgirl, Kia-Kawaii princess, mel11, Sallywags, CharmingPiper, ilovedrew88, trina-k, Faith-Charmer, Sparkling Cherries, wickedwms, AsAlways, nameless, Leigh1986, rcaqua, ChiaraStorm **again, lol and **hazza123** for reviewing! They were all very much appreciated.

**Panther28**: You'll just have to wait and see. Grins coyly, strongly hinting that you are right then looks about innocently. But sssshhhh! Thanks for taking the time to review!

**Flephanie**: I look forward to your crazy but highly amusing reviews. Oh are you ever goin to update Cursed? I know you prob have exam too but what about me? Hmm? What about my fanfiction needs?

**Inversnaid**: yeah, I will be goin into the Paige/ Adam story a bit later on so look out for that. Thanks for the review!

So if you haven't collapsed into a coma during the huge period of time that elapsed between the first chapter and this one (sorry again) then please review! I know I don't deserve it but,I'll love you! (pouts in an adorable and irresistable fashion)


	3. A Few Days After

In Love, Actually.

Chapter Three

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"You are soooo going down beeatch!"

"Oh I don't think so," said Chris, frantically pushing on the buttons on the remote in his hands.

He and Katie had been playing 'Halo Seventy Nine' for the past two hours on the 'X-Box 20' at her house, both of them permenantly engaged in battle with the other, only breaking their concentration to hurl insults. Suddenly the doorbell rang "Are you going to go get that?" asked Chris.

"Uh, no way am I moving now when I'm winning," said Katie. "You go get it."

"Why should I? It's your house!" complained Chris. "And besides _I'm_ winning."

"I don't think so loser," she retorted, as the doorbell rang again.

"Fine, I'll get it," said Chris with a sigh. "IT'S OPEN!" he bellowed, his eyes never moving from the screen in front of him.

"Hey party people!" greeted Tom, as he entered the room with Benji not far behind.

"How many times have I told you guys that this is an open house?" asked Katie, irritated. "Don't bother with all of this polite knocking the door crap."

"Plenty of times, but I started ignoring you after that time I walked into your living room to find your parents quietly watching TV," said Benji. "They totally freaked out, told me to take whatever I wanted but warned me they would ring the cops after I left and give them a full despcription."

"That never happened," said Katie.

"I know but the thought that it would is enough to make me continue to ring the doorbell in all houses other than my own," said Benji. "Even my own sometimes cause no-one knows what my parents could be up to." He shuddered at this idea, then sat down on the nearest seat.

"So who's winning?" asked Tom.

"Me," said Chris and Katie and unison, causing the other two boys to laugh.

"Just hold on two secs so I can finish Chris off, then we can set up for all four of us to play. Then I can have the satisfaction of whipping all of your asses, at the same time and everything," said Katie, licking her lips in concentration . She began constantly pushing on one button yelling, "Die! Die!" in a shrill, evil tone before yelling "Yes!" and pumping her fist in the air. She jumped to her feet and began her victory dance in front of Chris, who put down his controller in defeat and watched her prance about the living room with an amused smile on his face.

"Fine, fine, you were better," he admitted. "May we forever all bow down to the greatness of Princess Kate."

"Hey! That's_ Queen_ Kate to you mister," she scolded him, as her phone started to ring. "Hold that thought while I answer this," she said as she went into the next room to pick up the receiver. "Hello?"

"Hey Katie, it's me," came Wyatt's voice from the other end of the phone. There was silence on Katie's end. Not to be discouraged, he started to say what he had planned to say anyway. "Look, I just rang to say I'm sorry about these last few days, I didn't mean to upset you."

"Well you did," said Katie, after a few moments.

"It's just that incase you haven't noticed, I'm kinda crazy about you and I just can't bare the thought of not seeing you for months at a time," he said.

"You think it's easy for me?" she asked, slightly irritated.

"No, that's not what I meant," said Wyatt, "It's just that I don't see why you wouldn't jump at the chance to spend all that extra time together."

"How can you still not get this?" demanded Katie.

"Oh-oh," said Chris, when the sounds of Katie yelling, at whom he assumed was his brother, were recognised in the living room.

"What's going on?" asked Benji.

"Lemme guess," said Tom. "Trouble in an already rocky paradise . . .again."

"Sort of," said Chris. "Wyatt wants to stay here and go to Golden Gate, for the sole reason of Katie."

"What is the dude thinking?" demanded Benji.

"Yeah, I mean has he met Katie?"

"I have wondered," said Chris. "They've been fighting about this for a couple of days now."

"Well no wonder she's pissed off," said Tom. "They have been going out for what? Almost five months and he still doesn't get her."

"Well to be fair she _is_ a girl, Nature's greatest mystery," said Benji.

"I thought you said that Nature's greatest mystery was how you had managed to pass any of your exams last year," said Tom, confused.

"No that's the _Universe's_ greatest mystery," explained Benji.

"Oh right," said Tom. "Wait, how is that different?"

"Shut up," said Benji, cheerfully. "The point is, that Katie is kind of hard to figure out sometimes, I mean give the guy some credit for sticking with her this long. Until now we were the only three who have managed it."

"Don't be blaming this on her!" protested Chris. "She's the one that's being rational. She just doesn't want him to throw his dream away for the sake of a hormone fueled teenage relationship. My brother is the idiot here, he doesn't deserve her."

"Ooh is little Christabella jealous?" asked Benji.

"Don't be ridiculous," said Chris, as normally as he could manage, trying not to give away that he had struck a nerve. "And **don't **call me that," he warned, through gritted teeth. He paused to think while letting out a tired sigh before continuing. "I just think he is being a little blindsighted about this. He's only thinking about the now insteading of the long term affects."

"Woah! Hold on here!" said Tom. "Since when has Chris Halliwell lived for anything other than the moment?"

'You'd be surprised,' thought Chris, but he kept this remark to himself, seeing as it involved talking about demons and revealing he was a witch with actual magical powers. "He hasn't. But Wyatt Halliwell usually does."

"Love makes you do messed up things," concluded Benji.

"Probably," mumbeled Chris. "Ugh, it doesn't matter anyway, he'll apologise, admit he was wrong, she'll eventually forgive them and they'll probably make up and get back together like they always do."

""Probably," agreed Tom, who couldn't help but notice the undertone of resentment in his friend's voice. He would have thought that Chris would be happy to know that his brother and best friend would patch things up. After all it must be uncomfortable for him when they were fighting, having to be in the middle of it all the time and put up with both sides of the story. Then again maybe Benji had hit the nail on the head with his jealousy comment, even if he had only said it to poke fun at Chris for his own amusement. Either way, Tom didn't know and he resigned himself to this fact, seeing as he just couldn't picture Chris lusting after Katie when he could date pretty much any other girl they knew.

"Uggghk!" came Katie's frustrated gargle as she re-entered the room after hanging up on Wyatt.

"Then again," Tom added with a grin.

"Your brother infuriates me," she told Chris with clenched teeth as she threw the cordless phone down with vigor and planted herself beside Chris on the floor.

"Welcome to my world."

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"Your best friend infuriates me!" exclaimed Wyatt Halliwell, as he threw his arms up in the air, in pure frustration.

"Welcome to my world," said Chris.

Chris had been lying on his bed, reading through a book about various potions that he had borrowed from the Magic School's library in preparation for their lesson with Piper later on in the evening when his brother had strode in to vent his frustrations on Chris. He had immediately closed the book with a sigh, knowing right and well that he wasn't going to get any work done while Wyatt was rhytmically pacing the room; back and forth, back and forth, back and forth in front of him.

"Dude, you are seriously going to wear a hole in the floor," cried Chris in protest to the pacing. "And I know that is just a saying, but in this house, normal sayings tend to have literal consequences so please sit down before you end up in the kitchen."

"What's it to you?" asked Wyatt, irked slightly. "I just assumed you'd enjoy the sight of me crashing through the floor and generally injuring myself."

"Damn right I would," said Chris. "It's just that I _really_ don't want to get up in the middle of the night, still half asleep to go to the toilet, only to fall through the giant hole in the floor caused by you, end up in the sink and break all of my bones."

Too annoyed for the amusement his brother's long winded sarcastic comment had brought him to show on his face, Wyatt merely gave into Chris' request and sat himself down on the chair at the desk in their room. Still unable to sit still, he began constantly tapping on his thigh or drumming his fingers repeatedly on the desk, the sound of which annoyed his younger brother, but seeing as it wasn't a third as annoying as the pacing, he decided to let it go.

"So what's up?" asked Chris, half-sarcastically. "Did you and Katie have another fight?"

Chris was glad looks couldn't kill as Wyatt glared at him. "You know fine rightly we did. It's just that, the more I try to reason with her, and try to make her see that I really don't mind going to GGU, cause it's quite a good school and that it means we could be together the madder she gets!"

"And it hasn't occured to you to stop trying to reason with her . . . why exactly?" asked Chris, who already seemed to be bored with this conversation and what he viewed as his brother's stupidity.

"Cause this time I don't want to give in!" explained Wyatt. "I know that I am right here because I know what I am feeling."

"Have you ever stopped to think that maybe the problem here is that she doesn't feel the same?" asked Chris.

"WHAAAT!" roared Wyatt, leaping up from his seat and marching meanicingly towards Chris. "Has she said that to you!"

"Woah! Hold on there, Wy," said Chris, quickly, holding his hands out in front of his defensively. "I was only messing with you," he said, immediately regretting his teasing remark.

"Oh," said Wyat, deflating again and returning to his seat. "I'm sorry, I forgot you turned into an ass during tense situations and made non-stop supposedly mood lightening commments that are often misconstrued as serious remarks. I will warn you now, that it is neither the time nor the place and I'm certainly not in the right sort of disposition to put up with such parlance!"

"Wow, you use big words when you are mad," said Chris, slightly taken back at this outburst. "Have you ever thought about doing an English degree?"

"Oh why do I even bother to try and talk to you about these things?" Wyatt muttered to himself, although it was loud enough for Chris to hear, as he put his head in his hands.

"What?" asked Chris. "I was just saying! Besides I thought it was a reasonable idea, I mean after all, you've already got the poetry part down and . . ."

"Chris, I beg you! Stop, before I can no longer control the urge to make you my personal punching bag."

"Ok," said Chris quietly.

"It's just that I really, **really** like her Chris," said Wyatt, quietly. "I think about her all the time to the point where I just have to get up and go see her! I just don't know if I will be able to cope with not being able to spend time with her when I want. I'm just going to be stuck sitting thinking about her!" There was a short awkward silence in the room, and Wyatt shifted uncomfortably in his seat after revealing how he felt about Katie to Chris. Summoning up his courage, he forced himself to look up at his brother, desperately trying to force his embarrassment to the side. As he expected, Chris was grinning like an idiot at him. Wyatt smiled grimly, bracing himself for the teasing he just knew was coming.

"You have got it so bad, it isn't even funny," said Chris, shaking his head.

"Then why do you look so freaking amused?" snapped Wyatt.

"Cause I think it's funny that you don't know Katie well enough to realise you aren't going to win this one."

"I have to try! I mean she can't win all the time and if I just . . ."

"No, let me finish," requested Chris. He took a deep breath. As much as it pained him to do this, he couldn't bare to see Wyatt this high strung about something he could help with, and he was feeling guilty enough. "You need to know when to pick your battles with Katie. There are somethings you have a chance of winning but otherwise she is just going to beat you down and you need to lean to recognise the difference. She has such an independent streak and feels really strongly about you going off to USC. The idea that you are making a life changing decision, and using her as the deciding factor terrifies her like nothing ever has before. I am sure he feels the same way about you as you do about her, and don't you want what's best for her?"

"Yeah, but . . ."

"Then you see her point," said Chris, firmly. "I know it'll be difficult for you at first, but you'll adjust eventually and get completely absorbed in the college life. And I bet that as soon as it happens, you'll realise that Katie was right all along and what a jackass you are being now."

"When did you grow up?" asked Wyatt.

"Oh I haven't and don't plan to any time soon," Chris assured him. "It's just that Katie happens to be my speciality. All other girls will remain a mystery to me to the day I die I'm sure, but Katie has spent so much time trying to help me gain some insight into the female mind during one girlfriend crisis or another I've kind of picked up a few hints here and there about how she works at least."

Wyatt laughed. "Thanks man."

"No probs," said Chris, waving it off. "Though we should probably go do something many now like some basketball or something, cause that chat has left me feeling a little . . ."

"Pink?"

"Exactly."

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"Hey, what's going on?" asked Chris as he entered the attic. "Hey dad," he said, smiling at Leo who was sitting forward on the sofa. Piper, was flicking through the pages of the Book of Shadows while Polly was hanging the crystal over their map of San Franciso.

"Hey sweetie," said Piper. "The Elders want us to see what we can find out about two innocents that were murdered last night. Polly already checked the news and it said they both died from trauma to the abdomen, which was particularly burned."

"Energy ball," commented Chris to no-one in particular. "But wait, what do you mean, 'particularly burned'?"

"The officer that they interviewed said that the reason the victims haven't been identified yet is because every inch of their skin is covered in burns, blisters and boils of some sort."

"He said it looked like they had a strong acid poured over them," Polly informed him, who was still scrying for any demonic activity in the city that could possibly be connected to the demons they were after.

"What can I do to help?" asked Chris.

"Well I'm having trouble finding any acid spraying demons in the book, so I was wondering if you could . . . you know," said Piper, waving her hands about, unable to think of the right words. "Do your thing."

Chris chucked quietly, "Sure thing mom," he said, walking over to the book and placing his hands over it, wiggling his fingers and focusing on what he was looking for. Suddenly, the pages began flipping until finally remaining open at the desired page. Piper and Leo came over to join him at the book to read the open pages.

"Hmm, Brunghad demons," said Leo. "Can't say I'm familiar with them."

"Says here that they have poisionous fins on their arms, which if comes into contact with skin, causes it to corrode and almost burn away," said Piper.

"Sounds about right," said Chris. "Don't you think? It was the closest thing I could find to acid spraying demons."

"Well it's not exactly a common demon trait so you've probably got the right ones," said Leo, patting Chris reassuringly on the back.

"Hey got a hot spot over here!" announced Polly, as the crystal fell. She leaned in closer, peering at the place it had pinpointed for them. "It's a warehouse not far from where the victims were found."

"Good," said Piper. "Is there any potion or vanquishing spell?"

"No," said Chris, after double checking.

"Good, that means you guys will just be able to deal with them with your powers, right?" asked Leo.

"Yes, well that or there just isn't a known vanquishing method yet which means that after getting our asses kicked we are going to have to come back here and make something," said Chris.

"Always the pessimist," scolded Piper.

"I'm going to go back Up There and let them know we've identified the species of demon," said Leo. "See if we can establish any motive and determine wheter more of their kind willbe carrying out similar attacks."

"Well let's go," she said, taking Chris' hand, as Polly walked over to join them after pocketing a few exploding potions from the shelves.

"Wait a minute, shouldn't more than just the three of you go just in case?" asked Leo, concerned.

"Who?" asked Piper. "Phoebe and Jason are 'working', or more likely discussing baby plans, no point in disturbing them, Patricia is out with her friends, as is Petulia. Wyatt is over at Katie's making up . . ."

"Making out more like," said Chris.

" . . .And Paige and Adam are having a romantic lunch!" finished Piper, ignoring Chris' comment. "I've learnt to be flexible by now and know how to work with what I got. Besides, we can always call for someone if we need them!"

"Well, if you are sure," said Leo, hesitantly.

"I'm sure," she said. "Just go do your job and let me do mine," she said just before Chris orbed them out of the attic.

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Wyatt opened the door of the manor and quickly entered into the hall and pulled Katie in with him after not sensing any of his family in the house. She giggled as she shut the door behind her and Wyatt wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her closer to him as he kissed her. "Wyatt stop!" she muttered against his lips. "What if someone's in?"

"Hello? Anybody in?" called Wyatt in the empty manor to humor her as he walked into the living room, a secure grip still on her waist. "See, no-one here, we are all alone," he assured her. "Now where was I?" he asked grinning as him and Katie tumbled backwards on to the sofa.

"Perfect," she said, as she kissed him again. She pulled away a few moments later when they heard some noises coming from upstairs. "What the hell was that?" she asked, her eyeborws lowered.

"Oh Chris has probably just left his cd player on again," said Wyatt, getting up, knowing it was probably much more than this.

"Then how come it just started playing?"

"Bonus track?" suggested Wyatt, who was already halfway to the stairs. "But stay here, I'm going to go check it out just to be sure. Don't move," he reitterated, sprinting towards the attic once out of her sight.

"Well, well, well, what do we have here?" he asked, an energy ball already ignited in his hand when he entered the room to find five demons chanting at the five points of the pentagram they had drawn around the Book of Shadows. He threw the energy ball at one of them which made it erupt in flames and leave a scorch mark on the floor. One of the demons threw an athame at him which he quickly froze before flicking his wrists at him in an attempt to make him explode.

"Oh-oh," said Wyatt when the demon remained unfazed and was in fact running towards him, after lifting the athame out of thin air. Meanwhile, two of the other demons threw fireballs at him while the third unsheated a sword with intricate markings along the blade. Wyatt, who had been freezing the fireballs, orbed across the attic just in time to avoid the demon with the athame, and over to the boulder which held Excalibur. He removed it from the stone, and conjured a large shield to help defend himself.

With a few swift swings of the sword he had decapitated one of the demons and found the time to blink at another, causing it to combust. While locked in battle with the demon who had an impressive sword of his own, Wyatt side-kicked the other remaining demon who had taken a run at him to the other side of the attic, knocking him out as he hit the wall.

Wyatt, struck out at the demon with his sword but it blocked the attack with it's own. Wyatt quickly moved his shield so the demon's next swing hit of it rather than him. Then Wyatt took the final, battle winning lunge at the demon in front of him. Breathing heavily, Wyatt remained tense, Excalibur raised in his firm grip and clutching his shield, just in case.

"Wyatt?"

Wyatt spun around to find Katie standing at the attic door with a confused look on her face.

"Wyatt what are those in the air and why do you have a, BEHIND YOU!" she frantically yelled.

Wyatt turned round to see the previously unconcious demon heading towards him with an athame he must have picked off the floor and he quickly unfroze the fireballs that were still hanging in the air and they flew forward with a jolt towards the demon. Most of them hit the attic wall but luckily, one hit the demon and vanquished him in an eruption of flames that turned him to dust.

His heart pumping like mad, he turned to Katie, "I can explain . . ." He stopped mid-sentance , dropping Excalibur and the shield on the floor, rushing over to her, to cushion her fall as she fainted onto the attic floor.

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A/N: I apologise once again for the spelling errors and typos due to lack of spell check! I think I got most of them but please let me know if you spot any so I can fix them!

I found it quite amusing, going through some reviews that so many people seem to have a preference to which brother they want Katie to end up with. I can't believe I write a story for which people can ship! So in a vote type thing when you are reviewing, would you mind adding in whether you support C/K or W/K? I'm just curious to know what you all think even though I know the way things will end up but I want to make sure I keep you guessing along the way!

**Flephanie**: Yes, actually, it is pretty sad that you are jealous of Katie if you must know. I mean for one thing, fictional, for another she came from the fiction of MY mind. That says wonders about your sanity levels! lol. Only (half) joking, after all your reasoning was good. (It was pretty much along the lines of Chris is Chris and Wyatt is Wyatt, right?) Thanks as ever for the long review!

**Faith-Charmer**: I'm glad you appreciate the humor. My favourite sister tends to be Piper cause she kicks so much ass, but I do have a soft spot for Paige on certain days. I do like Phoebe, but I know she's not my favourite. As for Bianca, I have nothing against her. She was only in the one episode and I thought she was a great character in it. Chris-Crossed was so cool cause you got some insight into Chris' life. Anyway, thanks for reviewing.

Also a big thanks to **hazza123, Sparking Cherries **(I LOVE it when ppl quote specific lines they like), **rcaqua, Zeria, bec7012, maggie0, ChiaraStorm, ilovedrew88 **and **Little Miss-Spell-of-the-Week **for their delightful and much appreciated reviews!


	4. Anniversary

**In Love, Actually**

**Chapter Four: Anniversary**

Wyatt carefully picked up Katie after checking to make sure she had no injuries and carried her over to the sofa in the attic. "Dad! Paige! Chris! Anybody!" he called urgently. A soft blue glow appeared in the room as Leo orbed in to the attic. "Hey Wyatt, what can I do for you?"

"Katie saw me vanquishing a demon," he said, winicing in preparation for the yelling that he knew was about to commence.

"What? How?" asked Leo, rushing over to Katie to make sure she was all right.

"We were downstairs making ou . . .uh . . . making food," Wyatt quickly corrected himself. "When we heard chanting coming from upstairs so I told her not to move and I came up here and started fighting. Then I turn round and find her standing there, looking shocked and asking why there were balls of fire frozen in the air. She warned me as another demon came running at me just in time for me to vanquish him, then she fainted. Really, not something I'd ever expect the ballsy Katie Henessey to do."

"How could you have been so careless?" asked Leo, angrily.

"Sorry," said Wyatt. "But I mean it's not like I invited her up here, 'Hey Katie, wanna come to the attic and watch me kick some demon butt with my magical powers?' Does that really sound like something I would say?"

"I know, sorry for snapping," said Leo. "It's just that we're trying to crack down on the awareness of the exsistence of magic at the moment after some close calls concerning exposure recently. The Elders aren't too keen on telling anyone except for in life threatening situations."

"Don't worry, Katie is very trustworthy," Wyatt assured him. "Once she gets over the shock she will be fine with it."

"I'm not sure if we can allow it to get that far," said Leo.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that the other Elders probably are going to want to keep her in the dark, have her mind wiped with memory dust."

"Oh come on! Are you serious?" asked Wyatt. "That's not fair! If she knew I'd be able to orb back and forth from college to see her."

"I don't think that constitutes as life threatening," said Leo, almost apologetically. "But I can make an appeal for you to the Elders if you want," he offered.

"Please," said Wyatt, gratefully.

"I'm going to have to put her into a deeper sleep though until they've made their decision," Leo told him, walking over to Katie.

"Fine."

Leo put his hands out over Katie's head and a golden glow came from them that caused Katie to stir a little before becoming comatose.

"So where is everyone?" asked Wyatt, as he looked down lovingly at his girlfriend, who was fast asleep.

"Your mom, Chris and Polly went to vanquish some Brunghad demons about an hour ago," said Leo. "Actually they should be back by now."

"If they were in trouble we would have sensed it or heard their calls," said Wyatt, going over to the book. "Brunghad demons, is this them here?" he asked, pointing to the page in front of him.

"Yeah, why?"

"Cause three of the demons that were here match this picture," said Wyatt. "It was these guys and two others, they were trying to do something to the book," he said, pointing to the black pentagram that had been marked on the floor, the Book of Shadows at its centre.

"They were after the book?" asked Leo.

"I'm almost positive."

"Well if they were here and they are the demons the Elders sent Piper, Chris and Polly after, then they were probably trying to lure them out of the house to get to the book," said Leo. "Which means . . ."

"It was a trap," concluded Wyatt. "Stay here with Katie, I'm going to go find them."

"What's wrong?" asked Leo, when his eldest son didn't orb out.

"I can't sense them," said Wyatt.

"Me neither," said Leo. "Ok, now I'm worried, hold on." Quickly Leo orbed out, moments later orbing back in. "They're not in the Underworld either, I couldn't sense them there."

"So where the hell are they?" asked Wyatt. Then, out of the corner of his eye he noticed the map on the table, the crystal still in its position.

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"Eight bottles of beer on the wall, eight bottles of beer. Take one down pass it around, seven bottles of beer on the wall! Seven bottles of beer on the wall . . ."

Piper closed her eyes and took a deep breath, wishing that when she opened her eyes this nightmare would all be over. Slowly, and almost cautiously, she opened one eye.

"Six bottles of beer on the wall, six bottles of beer . . ."

Sighing, she opened her eyes and accepted her fate. They had found some Brunghad demons in the warehouse as they'd expected, along with a few of another type that they didn't recognise. They'd fought them all of, with difficulty however, seeing as exploding didn't work on the anonymous demons but Chris had called for a sword that one of the demons was carrying, Piper froze every fireball and energy ball that was sent their way, Polly created hallucinations to confuse them and so between the three of them they just about managed to survive. But that was when things got really grim.

When they had tried to orb out they couldn't, the doors were locked and the entire room appeared to be magically sealed. They'd tried to blast their way out but all of the doors and windows were not to be opened by either Piper's firepower or the potions Polly had brought. Chris had even come up with a few different spells that should have freed them but even they didn't work. "Probably needs to be unsealed from the outside," he had mumbled, slightly embarrassed and annoyed at himself for not being able to get them out with one of his spells. After the first twenty minutes of trying to call people to come and let them out from the outside, they gave up, accepting that their family couldn't hear them and were just going to have to realise they were missing by themselves.

Chris and Polly were not helping Piper's mood. They'd started their inane song about bottles of beer from one hundred and had been singing away for the past half hour with Chris using the demon's sword to conduct them. Piper had been subjected to listening to it as they had ignored all of her warnings, "We're just trying to make the best of a bad situation," Polly had said.

So here they were, trapped inside the warehouse, singing stupid childish songs and no one even cared enough to come and find them. 'Typical,' thought Piper. 'Too wrapped up in their babies and their romantic anniversary lunches and their girlfiends and their . . .'

Piper lost her bitter train of thought when she heard someone banging on the front door of the warehouse. "Hello? Is anyone there? Mom? Chris? Polly? Hello?"

"Wyatt!" yelled Piper, leaping to her feet, "We're in here! We couldn't orb out and we tried everything else to try and get out but nothing worked! We think it just needs to be opened from the outside!" she shouted out to him.

"Uh, OK," he called into them. A moment later, the door swung open and Piper ran over to Wyatt, flinging her arms around him. "Oh you are such a good son!" she prasied him. "Thank you, thank you, thank you!" Then she hit him on the shoulder.

"What was that for?"Wyatt asked.

"For not coming sooner!" she said.

"Sorry, I've been kind of busy, plus no-one could sense you or hear you calling."

"So how'd did you get in?" asked Chris, getting up off the ground and dusting himself off.

"Oh I just conjured a key that would fit the lock."

"Wait just a second here," said Chris, disbelieving. "Are you saying, it was a simple matter of unlocking the door from the outside?"

"Yep."

"I have to get out of here," said Chris, shaking his head and leaving the warehouse so he could orb out. "Are you guys coming or what?"

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"Oh my God, Katie!" said Chris, having orbed into the manor. He rushed over to his friend quickly, deeply concerned. "What happened?"

Wyatt retold them all the story as Leo went Up There to find out what the Elders were going to do about Katie.

"What were you guys even doing here?" asked Piper. "I thought you two were at her place?"

"We were," said Wyatt. "But her parents came home and we . . . uh . . . didn't want to get in their way."

"Nicely said," said Piper with a knowing smile. "Polly could you go downstairs please and get the cleaning supplies? I want to get this pentagram cleaned of the floor."

"Sure thing Auntie Piper," Polly chirped before heading for the kitchen.

Chris however was at the book, going through the pages in his own special way. "Wyatt, these other demons, did they look like this?" Wyatt joined his brother at the book. "Yeah, they did actually, how did you know?"

"Because these were the demons that fought alongside the Brunghads at the warehouse," said Chris.

"What are they?" asked Piper.

"Filarka demons," read Chris. "Big, bad, ugly, throw fireballs, you know the usual. Very into honour and all of that. Take part in combat armed with swords," said Chris, going over to the sword he had brought back with him.

"Oh, snap," said Wyatt, producing the sword the demon had left behind when he had been vanquished. He had thought nothing of it at the time, having been preoccupied with Katie and had put it in the attic cupboard for safe keeping.

"What are those markings on them?" asked Piper.

"A sign of their tribe apparently," said Wyatt, going back to the book. "The Filarka live in separate clans, only joining forces when they all face a common enemy."

"Well they've all joined forces with the Brunghads," said Piper. "Those two swords have different markings," she noticed, having looked back and forth between the weapons her sons were holding.

"But why?" asked Chris. "For the book? Why would two completely independent demon species join together to get their hands on our book now?"

"Me and Phoebe put crystals around the book a couple of days ago for protection come to think of it," said Piper. "But then I moved them yesterday when I was setting that trap for the cookie thief."

"Sorry," said Wyatt, sheepishly.

"It's OK," said Piper. "Just don't eat more than your fair share of cookies again. Especially not before dinner. Anyway, me and Pheebs recognised that all the demons that have attacked in the past month or so seem to be after the book."

"Another mystery," said Chris.

Just then, Leo orbed back into the attic."Well?" asked Wyatt hopefully. His face fell when he noticed the grim look on his father's face and the bag of memory dust in his hands. "This is so unfair!"

"I know," said Leo. "But the other Elders over-ruled me, they said there was no real reason why Katie should be alerted to the magical world."

"Screw the Elders!" said Wyatt.

"Been there, done that," said Piper, wiggling her eyebrows suggestively. "Mom!" yelled Wyatt, a look of horror on his face. "Eww you did not say that," said Chris, shaking his head in fear. "That was so uncalled for," said Wyatt, who was looking slightly ill. "Oh please, how do you think you came into exsistence?" asked Piper, enjoying watching her sons' faces. "The stork dropped us off on your doorstep!" insisted Chris, quickly covering his ears with his hands in case they told him otherwise. "Now if you'll excuse me I have to go throw up for the rest of my life," he said, leaving the room as Polly entered, bucket and sponge in hand.

"What's the matter with him?" she asked.

"You don't want to know," said Wyatt. "Let's just say that after we get this over with, I'm going to need to book several lifetimes worth of therapy."

"Don't be such a drama queen," said Piper. "Well we'd better get this off the floor, those swords put away, the book and all other wicca items hid before we wake Katie up and spin her some longwinded story about why she was asleep in our attic."

"I'm going to go get Chris," said Wyatt, grumpily. "If he thinks he's getting out of cleaning he's got another thing comming."

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"Katie! Katie!"

As Katie slowly woke up she saw a blurred image of Wyatt and Leo leaning over her. "Where am I?" she asked groggily, gently sitting up on the attic sofa.

"In the attic sweetie, you fainted," said Leo, comfortingly. "Wyatt called me when he couldn't wake you up and I came straight over."

This made sense to Katie, even in her half asleep condition as she knew that Leo was some type of doctor, though she'd never known the specifics of his work. "What happened?" she finally asked, after searching her mind to find it blank. "The last thing I remember we were, um, on the sofa and you were about to go upstairs to investigate some noise."

"Yeah, as I thought Chris had left music on in the attic and you must have came up after me a little too quickly, got head rush and blacked out," said Wyatt.

"You bumped your head a little and have a mild concussion," Leo told her gently. "Probably why you were out so long, but don't worry you will be fine."

"How long was I unconcsious for?" she asked, rubbing the back of her head and feeling for her bump.

"About half an hour or so," said Wyatt. "You had me worried for a while there Hennessy."

"Sorry," she said. "Next time, I'll be sure to think about you before I involuantarily faint."

"That's my girl."

"Hey we're home!" came Piper's voice from downstairs, as her Chris and Polly entered the manor as planned, staged for Katie's benefit.

"Come on," said Wyatt. "Let's get you home."

"OK," said Katie, allowing herself to be helped up of the sofa, still feeling a little woozy. "Thanks Mr. Wyatt." The peculiarity of Wyatt being named after his father's surname just hit Katie at this moment, causing her to grin. She had often wondered why all of the Halliwell women refused to take their husbands' names when they got married and why all of their children had been given this name as well. Her head began throbbing again at this point so she promptly ceased wondering and snuggled into Wyatt's secure grip on her.

"Please, call me Leo," he said cheerfully. "We're practically family after all," he added with a wink much to Wyatt's horror. He stopped dead, "Dad! What planet do you live on?" 'Please don't answer that truthfully by saying you occassionally like to live on a heaven like planet with your angelesque co-workers,' he added in his mind. "I'm sorry about him," he said to Katie, shaking his head in disbelief as they left.

"Don't worry about it," said Kaite smiling. She had found the comment rather amusing, not to mention Wyatt's horrified reaction.

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"Here's to us," said Paige, raising her glass of champagne and Adam did the same, clinking their glasses together. "And to when we first met, this day thirteen years ago."

"Here, here," said Adam, taking a sip of his champagne. "Do you know, that it was on that day, that I knew I was going to fall in love with you?"

"Stop," said Paige, modestly, "You'll make me blush!"

"Good," said Adam, smiling at her. "I mean I already had a healthy dose of lust after merely looking at you but there was just something about how you promised you were going to vanquish the demon that had just tried to kill my sister that was just so . . .sexy."

Paige laughed, "Oh yeah, talking about potions and demon flesh has always got the boys' hearts racing!"

"No seriously," said Adam. "There was something in your eyes, a twinkle of fun and mischief that made me think, 'Wow, I'm really going to love this girl.'"

"And all without powers of premonition," said Paige, impressed as she leaned across the table to give him a quick kiss on the lips.

"After a month I just knew, that you were the girl I was going to marry."

"Well you went a little wrong there, didn't you?" asked Paige, playfully. "You didn't marry me."

"Not for lack of trying," reminded Adam. "I proposed to you the day after you told me you were pregnant. You turned me down."

"We'd only known each other a couple of months!" protested Paige. "I didn't want to get married because the groom felt a sense of obligation!"

"But you knew I was in love with you even then," said Adam. "When I proposed to you a few months later you still weren't having it! You told me to back off and stop asking!"

"Pregnancy hormones?" suggested Paige with a laugh. "I still felt it wouldn't be right for us to tie ourselves down like that when we were doing so many other things."

"And you were right," said Adam, fumbling around in his pocket.

"Aren't I always? Now let's see what I'm going to have for lunch." She looked up from her menu a few seconds later to find Adam by her side on one knee, holding a small, black jewellery box.

"What are you doing?" she asked nervously, her heart pumping manically.

"Something I should have done a long time ago."

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"Hey guys!" said Paige, as she and Adam entered the manor several hours later and found most of the family in the attic. "What'd we miss?"

"Well Chris, Polly and I were trapped in a warehouse for over an hour after fighting off two types of demons who had lured us out of the house to get to the book but Wyatt was here and fought them off, but then Katie saw them and fainted but the Elders insisted we wiped her memory so we told her she had just blacked out and sent her home," said Piper all in one breath, "How was your day?"

"Oh you know, the usual," said Paige. "Some paperwork at Magic School, got my nails done, went for lunch, got engaged, did a little shopping, went to the . . . "

"Wait a second!" squealed Phoebe. "You got engaged?"

"Yep!" squeaked Paige, holding out her left hand for everyone to admire her diamond engagement ring. "Congratulations!" said Phoebe going over to hug her younger sister and Adam. "It's about time," Piper told Adam when it was her turn to congratulate the happy couple. Everyone that was there, hugged and told the couple how happy they were for them until Paige and Adam looked flushed at the end.

"Well we're going to have to celebrate this!" said Piper. "We can work on this demon book hunt later, as long as we keep a close watch on the book, there's no reason why we can't postpone investigating it just for a little while. Now on to more important things, do you guys want to stay in or go out?"

"I'd quite like to stay in," said Paige.

"As long as you don't mind cooking, of course," said Adam.

"Mind!" exclaimed Piper. "Don't be ridiculous, you know that cooking soothes me. OK so Chris can you go find out where Trish is and tell her to be home for dinner at half seven?"

"Oh I think Petulia is with her," said Adam.

"Sure thing," said Chris, orbing out to find his little sister and cousin.

"I'll ring Jason at work," said Phoebe, "Insist that he cancells his late night meeting."

"Wonderfu!" said Piper. "That's about everyone. So what will I make, what do you two want?"

"Something edible."

"I know just the thing," said Piper smiling.

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Chris orbed in behind a tree along a residential area. Peeking out from behind it, he saw Petulia sitting on a wall with one of her friends who he recognised as Tom's sister Kirsten who was Petulia's best friend. He walked on up the street a bit towards them, realising it was in fact Tom's house they were outside. "Hey Tuli, hey Kirsten."

"Hey Chris, what are you doing here?" asked Petulia.

"Looking for you and Trish actually," he said, looking about for his sister.

"Why what's the matter?" she asked quickly.

"No nothing like that," he said, knowing she probably thought there had been a demon attack. "Just had to let you know that we're having a special dinner tonight at half seven and to tell you to make sure you are not late."

"Why, what's going on?" Petulia asked, confused.

"It's not really my place to tell you so I'm just going to have to say you'll find out tonight."

"OK," said Petulia, slightly suspicious.

"So where is that darling sister of mine?" Chris asked. "Your dad said he thought you two were hanging out together today."

"We are," said Petulia. "She just went into the house to get herself a drink."

"OK," he said. "Kirsten is your brother around?"

"Yeah he's upstairs sulking," said Kirsten. "Dad grounded him for missing curfew last night."

"Is he allowed visitors?"

"Afraid not," said Kirsten.

"Sorry, let me rephrase, are your parents in?" Chris asked with a grin.

"Yes," she said smiling.

"Damn," said Chris, "Well tell him I'll talk to him later and Tuli be sure to pass on the message to Trish when she comes out OK?"

"Sure thing Chris, see you later."

"Bye!"

The dinner that night went very smoothly, Petulia was delighted for her parents as was everyone else and the happy atmosphere in the house the news had created, carried on for weeks after. The rest of the summer past all to quickly for the Halliwells, especially Wyatt, who with Chris' words echoing in his head had finally accepted a place at USC, knowing deep down it was for the best.

Chris had correctly known at the time that his words of wisdom to his brother would come back to bite him in the ass because Wyatt's decision meant that him and Katie instantly became joint at the lips for the rest of the summer, eager to make up for all the time they would be spending apart in the upcoming months. When Wyatt finally left, a week or so before his classes started so he could settle in, Chris didn't see Katie for a couple of days. But after that 'mourning period,' as Chris had come to think of it, everything went back to normal between the four best friends and as bad as Chris felt about it, he couldn't help but feel a certain sense of relief.

Phoebe and Jason spent the rest of the summer arguing over baby names, picking up every book they could find with names listed in them, relentlessly trawling through them for a girl's name beginning with a 'P' that they could agree on. Many a fight erupted during these searches, when a tired Jason would mumble under his breath that the 'P' tradition was a stupid one. Being hormonal, Phoebe would rant and rave and cry and wail, threatening him with divorce, only calming down when Paige or Piper talked her through it and brought her a tub of her favourite ice cream, or whatever else her particular craving currently was. There was one particular week when she would only eat food that Wyatt had made, "No wonder she's throwing up all the time," Chris remarked.

Surprisingly, Paige and Adam seemed in no particular rush to get a start on their wedding plans, instead having decided to wait a while longer to allow them to savour their engagement before they started stressing out over dresses, cakes, flower arrangements and the many other things that would have to be organised before the big day. Piper, on the other hand had different ideas and was seceretly doing her research on quotes and services available from all the businesses in the area that they might want to call. She was even taking snippings from bridal mgazines on different dress styles and patterns and putting all her research together in a srapbook which she could present to Paige and Adam as a early wedding present to make it easier for them when they finally decided to start organising it.

While they still were experiencing frequent attacks from various demons, all of whom appeared to be after the book, they had no more encounters with either the Brunghads or the Filarka demons. They had done some light re-con in the underworld but after suspiciously finding nothing new out about them, Piper went over the Filarka vanquishing potion with the younger members of the family in their weekly potions lesson. Having bottled and stored some of the better ones for safe keeping, she left it at that, being unable to see anything else they could do about it.

Piper had noticed a change in pace in the family dynamic, everyone seemed less worried about the demon attacks than they should be, all more wrapped up in their personal lives. Even Chris who usually spent hours pouring through books in Magic School seemed more distracted by other things and for once, Piper wasn't altogether sure it was such a bad thing. Besides they all needed to take a little break every now and again and she knew that the teenage Halliwells were becoming restless at the idea that their precious holidays were coming to a close. For them a fate far worse than demon attacks was looming, one that involved non-magical books and timetables .

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**A/N: **Hope you are glad to see that I'm getting back into the swing of updating. This story is going to jump about quite a bit as you may have noticed by now, it is sort of based around key events, it's a bit like a montage. (Tee hee, any excuse to say montage!) It's just cause a lot of things are happening but a different times so yeah, hope nobody minds too much.

Thank you to everyone who added in what pairing they prefered, it was very interesting to say the least. I personally, am keeping my mouth shut about what way it ends up in the very, very end of this tale but what I am saying is that there is a possible sequal to this story currently being brewed up in my mind in which pairings and feelings will still be switching around, not to mention the amount of switching that happens later on in this story. It's going to be a fun ride anyway.

Also I hope I am not moving too slowly on the actual plot of the story, with the demons that are after the book part. I did say that this story would be more concerned with the family and their relationships than BttP was but I just hope that doesn't put too many people off. If you think that the story is dragging a little just let me know and I'll crank up the demons a right away!

Thanks to everyone who reviewed once again, please keep them coming, as they kind of guilt trip me into writing more.

**hazza123**: Well as you see, even Katie doesn't know but lets just say, that this particular plotline will be resurrected at some point. Thanks for the review.

**bec7012**: yes, (embarrasesd smilie goes here) I did write that Paige was having a romantic lunch with Jason, but it was just a typo and I corrected it so thank you for alerting me to it and for reviewing. (Do it again!) Who said that:D

Thanks also to; **mell11, maggie0, CharmedClover, Sparkling Cherries, Panther28, Witching Hour** and **ilovedrew88** for reviewing! You guys rock!

Remember any questions you want answered (within reason) just ask, but that is proably going to involve a review (sigh) what a cruel, cruel twist of fate!


	5. School

**In Love, Actually**

**Chapter Five: School**

"This sucks so hard," said Benji as he stood outside the school building with his three best friends.

"I know," said Katie. "I can't believe the summer is over already."

"_I_ can't believe I had toskate all the wayhere!" said Chris. "Mom still refuses to get me a car and let Wyatt take his with him to L.A.!"

"How mean of her to let Wyatt keep his own car," said Tom, rolling his eyes at the laziness of his friend.

"It was!" insisted Chris. "Mom said she was going to give me and Trish a lift but because I refused to get out of bed at Stupid O'Clock this morning, they left without me!"

"Oh yeah, I forgot Trish was starting here today," said Katie, "How does she feel about it?"

"It's all school to her," said Chris.

"Your influence," said Benji. "So when are we going to show her the ropes? You know the best excuses to get out of gym, how to skip class without noticing, excuses for not handing in homework, etc."

"Dude, she could teach _you_ some tricks," said Chris, a certain amount of pride in his voice. "I mean seriously, the girl is good."

"I have the sudden urge to track her down," said Benji. "In fact she should come tonight, we can all swap our best material about."

"If I see her about, I'll invite her," said Chris, just as a teacher came up to them. "Christopher, Benjamin, Katherine, Thomas," he said, sternly,causing the four teenagers to visibly wince at the use of their full names. "Not getting off to the best start are you? Tardiness on the first day."

"What do you mean?" asked Chris, "The bell hasn't even . . ." He trailed off as the bell went. The teacher smirked at them before walking off and the four friends moaned.

"First day, and we're already late, this _isn't_ a good start," said Tom, picking up his school bag from the grass and heading towards the entrance with his friends. "I have Maths first period with Death Breath Bradley. As if life couldn't get any worse, I have to spend my Monday mornings with the teacher from hell, who'll probably put me in the front row again this year so there's no hope of escaping the poisionus fumes that come from his mouth."

"Shit one," said Katie, "I'm free first thank God, what you got?" she asked Chris.

"Me and Benj have double Physics," he said and his friends let out a sympathetic groan. "At least I'll catch up on my sleep."

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"MISTER HALLIWELL!"

Chris awoke with a start at the sound of his teacher's booming voice. He looked up to find Mr. Smyth and Benji standing in front of him with extremely different expressions; Benji's being one of amusement and his teacher's being one of rage. He was red in the face and when he exhaled his moustache twitched a little, causing Chris to break out into a grin. Realising he was in trouble, he changed his expression to apologetic and stood up quickly.

"I think you will find that the bell rang several moments ago," said Mr. Smyth, his brow furrowed in anger.

'Thatdamned bell seems intent on getting me in trouble today,' thought Chris before searching his mind for an excuse. "Uh sorry Sir," said Chris. "I, um, was just checking the desk for scratches."

"With your eyes closed?"

"Yes Sir, it's a technique I've been working on for quite some time now Sir," said Chris, causing Benji's smile to widen as he stood behind the fuming man. Chris' over-politeness, especailly the overuse of the term 'Sir' always seemed to rub their Physics teacher the wrong way.

"How do you explain the drool?"

"Cleaning off some pen marks Sir," said Chris. "Saliva is full of the enzyme amylase, Sir,so I thought that it might help break down the ink on the desk Sir, allowing me to better remove it from the desk."

"If you payed as much attention in my class, Mr. Halliwell, as you seem to in Chemistry, then we wouldn't be having this conversation," said Mr. Smyth. "Then again you seem to be ignoring the fact that amylase only breaks down starch so maybe not. I'll see you after school for detention Mr. Halliwell, enjoy the rest of your day."

"You too Sir," said Chris, walking out with Benji. "Damn!" he said, banging the locker nearest to him.

"Already in detention before third period on the first day," said Benji almost admiringly. "That has to be a new record, even for you."

"It is," said Chris. "But I mean it's not like I asked him to ramble on about the magnetic field for an hour! Uh my mother, is going to kill me."

"You think _you_ are in shit with mom?" came Patricia's voice, causing the two boys to turn round. "Try this on for size; first day of high school and I got detention during first period!"

"Wow, you're right, she is good," said Benji. "Better than you it seems."

"What did you do?" asked Chris, genuinely intrigued.

"I think it's more of a question of what did _you _do!" said Patricia. "Cause Mrs. Mc Cann seems to have some serious beef with you. When she realised I was your sister she gave me this big lecture about how I should quickly decide which brother I was going to take after during my time here and how she hoped for both my sake and hers that it was Wyatt! Then just because I was busy giving the girl beside me a manicure while she ranted on about the civil war and couldn't answer any of her questions she totally freaked out! Started on about how if I had decided I was following your path she would be sure to treat us the same and then gave me detention."

"Yeah, that doesn't really sound like my fault," said Chris. "If you'd done that in any teacher's class you would have been in trouble."

"Trouble yes," said Benji, "But you probably got detention because Chris here, let loose some locusts he had stolen from the Biology lab in her class last year. But she was never able to prove it was him so he managed to get away with it. She did know he had done itthough but because she couldn't punish him for it, she's punishing you."

"Well that's just great!" said Patricia, throwing her arms up in the air. "Any other teachers I better watch out for who have it in for you?"

"All of them?" suggested Benji.

"Fantastic!" said Patricia, "Thanks a lot," she said, storming off down the corridor.

"Hey Trish, wait a sec," Chris said, running after her. "If it helps you can tell everyone you are going to a sophmore's party tonight. Between that and detention on the first day your social status should be coming along nicely with the right crowd."

"I am?" asked Trish, increduously.

"Yeah, Benj is throwing a 'Back to Hell' bash tonight in honour of school starting up again and said to invite you, integrate you into life here," said Chris.

"Cool, but I doubt mom is going to let either of us out to a party on a Monday night," said Patricia. "Especially when we've both got detention after school."

"What she doesn't know, won't hurt her."

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Piper was at P3, doing inventory when the phone rang. "P3," she answered.

"Hi, is this Piper Halliwell? Christopher Halliwell's mother?"

"Yes," she said nervously.

"This is John Gilmore, principal."

"It's only the first day!" she exclaimed, practically shrieking down the phone at him. "What could Chris have possibly done on the first day!"

"Well, he got himself in detention for one thing for sleeping in Physics for one thing, but this is more of a general phone call of concern for the school year."

"What do you mean?" asked Piper, ignoring the detention, after all it was Physics and therefore forgiveable.

"Well, many of his teachers have expressed their concerns about Christopher's grades. Only his English, Chemistry and French teachers haven't came to me about him in the past year or so." Piper grinned at this, at once recognising the significance of these subjects. English, especially the poety aspect would help him with his spells, Chemistry with his potions and his whiteligher half meant that if someone spoke to him in any language he was immediately fluent at it. "What's so strange about this," the headmaster continued, "Is that in any aptitude or IQ tests we have carried out in school, he has scored very highly, I'm sure he'd have a perfect grade point average if he'd only apply himself!"

"Well Chris has some, uh, procrastination issues," said Piper, trying to think of the nicest way to put it, determined to defend her son to this man, even if she would rip his head off about it later, but that was different. She was his mother and therefore allowed to.

"So it would seem," said John Gilmore. "The main reason I'm calling you is about his physics, his teacher at this point is highy frustrated with him, falling asleep in his class today appears to be the final staw for Mr. Smyth, who wants your son to take part in the tutoring programme after school twice a week."

"A tutor?" asked Piper. "But you said it yourself, Chris is a smart boy, he just needs . . ."

"I explained that to him, which is why he says as long as Christopher at least passes every class test for the rest of the year, he will let it go. Otherwise, he will insist he gets a tutor."

"Ok, thank you Mr. Gilmore for calling me, I'll be sure to inform Chris he needs to sort himself out. Is there anything else?"

"Yes, Mr. Smyth was also hoping that you could have a word with your son about his attendance to Physics, seeing as during the last term of his junior year, Mr. Smyth only saw Christopher three times."

"Three times!"

"Yes."

"Well you can be assured that Chris and I will be having a very serious talk later on tonight," said Piper.

"I hope so Mrs Halliwell," said John Gilmore. "Oh thought I should let you know that your daughter will also be staying behind today for detention."

"Ok, thanks again," said Piper, hanging up the phone,her eyebrows down so her face was frowning."Why did I ever have kids?"

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"Mom, is it OK if I go around to Cheryl's house tonight?" asked Patricia, sweetly.

"Who's Cheryl?"

"Oh, a new friend I made today, she's in my History class."

"Isn't that the class you got detention in?" asked Piper.

"Yes, but I've already told you that was a complete misunderstanding!"

"Oh, I dont know . . ." said Piper.

"It was my fault," said Chris, coming to his little sister's rescue. They had decided to go with the Patricia making new friends thing to try and pull at Piper's heart strings, but it didn't seem to be working. "That teacher was holding an old grudge against me, found out Trish was my sister and took it out on her," he said.

"Oh," said Piper. "Well I guess that's all right then, as long as you are home for eleven," she warned.

"Thank you!" said Patricia. There was no point in arguing, she was going to take the three hours of fun that had been offered to her. Now, she was going to sit back and watch Chris try to get himself out of the house tonight.

"Um Patricia, would you mind going to watch TV for a while or something while I have a little chat with your brother?" Piper asked.

Apparently, she wasn't. "No problem," said Patricia getting up and leaving. This was bad, when Piper had a 'little chat' with Chris, he usuallyended upgrounded for a very long time.

"So what's up?" said Chris, giving her his best puppy dog eyes in a type of premtive strike.

"I became immune to those eyes two years ago," Piper reminded him.

"Sorry forgot," he said sheepishly.

"I got a call from your principal today," said Piper. "He was ringing on behalf of Mr. Smyth."

"Oh God," said Chris. "Mom, can't I just say in my defence of whatever the specifics of this conversation are, that you don't understand, **just** how boring Physics is!"

Piper couldn't help but laugh, a problem she had yet to overcome while trying to be mad with her youngest son. She told Chris what the phone call had been about and he was outraged. "Pass_ every _test?" asked Chris. "Ugh, I am _so_ getting a tutor."

"Not necessarily," said Piper, trying to console him. "If you just stopped procrastinating in class you'd be fine! Though I am warning you Christopher, if I hear so much as a whisper that you are skipping classes this year, I am going to ground you for so long that you will forget what colour the sky is. You will have so many chores you won't know what way to turn! It's for your own good really," she added, when she noticed that he was about to protest. "If you actually went to class every once in a while, passing the tests would be much easier."

"I'm doomed," said Chris. "I can't keep my eyes open long enough to actually learn anything that is going to come up in a test."

"Surely you must have leant something in Physics,"reasoned Piper.

"Mom, I have learnt exactly three things in that room over the past frew years," said Chris. "One, the earth orbits the sun, two light travels in straight lines and three, I can sleep with my eyes open."

"Then why didn't you do that today?" asked Piper. "Then you wouldn't have got detention ."

"The magnetic field melted my brain."

"Chris, I don't think the magnetic field can do that."

"Never under estimate the power of the magnetic field, the most boring field in exsistence."

"Look just try, OK?" asked Piper with a sigh."For me?"

"OK, but only for you," agreed Chris.

"Good boy."

"Mom?"

"What?"

"Would it be OK if I go around to Katie's later and keep her company? She's feeling a bit lonely since Wyatt left and both Tom and Benji are busy tonight," said Chris, a little too quickly.

"How convenient," said Piper. "What are they up to?" she asked, trying to catch him out.

"Benji is going out with his girlfriend and Tom got bogged down with homework," said Chris, who had already prepared himself for this question. Seeing his mother was still looking doubtful, he decided to go on, just to give the half lies some more depth. "His parents totally freak out if he gets anything below a 'B'. He's not too bad off though because he's in the year below us, he can just borrow all of Katie's assignments that she did last year and copy them." He didn't feel too bad asthese were only half lies, Benji's girlfriend would be at the party and Tom did have a lot of homework and pushy parents.

"Well, I really shouldn't but lucky for you I'm in a very giving mood so OK." said Piper. "But be home by half eleven, it is a school night after all."

"Thanks mom," said Chris, "I'm sure Wyatt would really appreciate this, after all he is one of the main reasons I'm doing this, I always have his best interests at heart."

"Don't push it Chris," said Piper.

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"So what are the kids up to tonight?" Phoebe asked Piper.

"Chris went to Katie's and Patricia went to one of her new friend's house," said Piper, going through the Book of Shadows. The three sisters were investigating the latest demon attack. "I hear she got detention," said Paige. "Another one of yours destined to take after one of us," she said, gesturing towards herself and Phoebe.

"Have you heard from Wyatt?" asked Phoebe.

"He called yesterday to say he would be orbing home for family dinner on Thursday, but that he probably wouldn't be able to stay long because of his work load at the moment."

"Which translates to 'I've ran out of clean clothes already and I'm orbing in to drop of my laundary,'" said Paige.

"_Or_," said Phoebe. "I can't eat another kebab without hurling and need a hot meal that has some identifiable food in it.'"

"It's probably a mixture of the two," said Paige. "Ah the college years, they were something special."

"What's so special about three years of studying?" asked Piper.

"So innocent, so untouched by life and frat boys," said Paige, smiling.

"What? It's not like I didn't have fun in college it's just that . . . "

"You didn't have as much fun as us."

"It depends on what your definition of fun is," said Piper. "Besides, I don't know what you are on about Pheebs, most of your college experience included missing classes to fight demons!"

"Say what you will, but my first year of college the first time aroundbefore I dropped out was awesome," said Phoebe.

"Then why did you drop out?"

"Shush! Now what about these demons?"

"Oh the usual," said Piper. "After the book like every other demons that come into the manner is these days. I think they were Jambini demons but I'm not sure, there's no picture. Just says the throw fire from their arms, which well, they did."

"I had that power once," said Phoebe absent mindedly.

"I know," said Paige, her eyes narrowed. "You used it on me."

"Oh yeah, sorry about that."

"Well there's nothing really special about them so wanna go kick the rest of their butt?" asked Piper.

"Sure, nothing better to do," said Paige, getting up and taking her sisters' hands.

"Should we see if Adam wants to come?" asked Phoebe.

"Nah," Paige said, "He's pretty tired, said he was going to have an early night."

The Charmed Ones orbed out of the manor and into the underworld, Paige sensing for the greatest concentration of Jambini demons and materialising there. "Yep, that's them," said Piper, flicking her wrists and happily blowing them up. A fight ensued as the twenty or so Jambini demons that were there faught for their lives as they tried to take on the infamous Charmed Ones. When there were only a couple left, Paige called for a rock and sent it towards one of their head's, knocking the demon out cold.

"What'd you do that for?" asked Piper, as she blew up the last one.

"Well we aren't any closer to finding out why all the demons are suddenly after the book, so I figured we might as well interrogate one just in case," said Paige.

"I'm not so sure anymore that there is a particular reason," said Phoebe, "I mean demons are after the book all the time."

"Yeah but it's usually one particular breed with a specific plan in mind," argued Paige.

"Paige is right Pheebs," said Piper. "We're getting nowhere with our seek and destroy way of doing things, it's about time we got some answers."

They orbed back to the manor attic and Paige dumped the demon on the floor. "Crystals! Circle!" she called, waving her hand and so entrapping the demon in the crystal cage. "Now we just wait until he wakes up."

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"I can't believe that you not only got out of the house, but got an extra hour out than me!" said Patricia. "And _you_ had a phone call from the principal! All I got was a measly detention!"

"Ah, much to learn, you still have my young apprentice," said Chris, as they entered Benji's house.

"Whatever Yoda," she muttered as they both headed for the kitchen. The house was filled with people drinking, laughing and shouting over the loud music that was being blasted around the house but they all seemed to be having a good time.

"Hey guys," said Chris, spotting his friends in the corner.

"Hey Chris!" said Benji. "Trish, glad you could make it!"

"Thanks for the invite, the rest of my day was really sucky," she said.

"Yeah I heard about your run in with Mc Cann," said Tom, sympathetically. "How'd your mom take it?"

"Not too bad, seeing as I took most of the blame for it," said Chris, looking around him as though he expected to be knighted for his brave deed, or at the very least receive a pat or two on the back. "Which is good, seeing as it's _mostly_ your fault," said Patricia, causing everyone to laugh.

A few hours and several drinks later, the usual gang had decided to play Truth or Dare. Having just announced to all of the guests that she was gay after a dare from Katie, Mary, Benji's girlfriend, spun the empty beer bottle and it landed on Chris. "Truth or dare?"

"Um . . . dare," Chris finally decided.

"OK," said Mary, thinking of a dare. "Oh I know, Chris I dare you to kiss Katie," she said, partly out of revenge for Katie's dare.

"WHAT!"

"For ten seconds," she chirped.

"Oh you've got to be kidding me," he said. "That's ridiculous, she's my best friend! She dates my brother!" he protested, seceretly reminding himself of all the reasons why this was a very bad idea. Wyatt would kill him for one thing, he would become even more awkward around Katie than he already was, he would . . . "Come on, you can't back out on us!" said Benji, interrupting his inner reasoning."You were the one who made me streak along the street last time we played."

"Yeah but that was mostly for his own personal pleasure," said Tom, wickedly.

Chris, looked over to Katie who'd been very quiet about this and was more than surprised to find her smiling. "Well we wouldn't want to make you forefit," she said. "Come, on we'll just get this over with, it's nothing really," she said, shuffling over to him. "OK guys, on my count," said Mary, looking at her watch. "Go!" Chris' heart was pumping so fast he thought he was going to pass out as he and Katie both tilted their heads and leaned in closer to each other, a moment which seemed to last a lifetime before their lips finally met. "Ten, nine, eight, seven, six!" counted their friends around them, but Chris barely noticed. He was kissing Katie. His best friend. His brother's girlfriend. This was soooo bad. "Two, one!"

Chris quickly pulled away and shifted away from her as much as he could, his cheeks going a deep red and he was sure that the heat radiating off them could melt icebergs. Much to Chris' horror, Katie started laughing, had it been that bad, he wondered. He'd never had any complaints before. He gave her a strange look and she grinned, "Oh I was just thinking about how you really are the 'love them then leave them' type," she explained. "Hey, don't worry, it's only a game!" she said, upon noticing how fiercely he was blushing.

"I know," he said, taking a deep swig of his beer, unable to look at her again.

"Your turn to spin," Tom reminded him.

"I'm going to the toilet," said Chris, getting up and leaving them.

"What was that about?" asked Benji.

"Oh he's just embarrased," said Katie with a dismissive hand gesture. "He'll get over it."

"I'll spin," said Benji, leaning forward into the circle and spinning the bottle, the neck of which pointed at Tom. "Truth or dare?"

"Uh, truth," said Tom, after deciding it was the safer option, after all_ he _didn't want to end up kissing Katie. "OK, truthfullyandquickly while Chris is out of the room, tell us what exactly is going on between you and his little sister." 'I should've picked dare,' he thought, squriming in his place. "I don't know what you are talking about."

"Wrong answer!" said Katie. "You picked the truth, so either tell it or you forefit."

"She's cool to talk to, that's all," said Tom after a few moments of awkward silence.

"It's so more than that dude," said Benji. "I saw you gazing after her in the hallway all gooey eyed!"

"Yeah and anytime anyone mentioned her today, you suddenly found your feet very interesting," remarked Katie.

"OK, OK, so I like her!" admitted Tom reluctantly, finally cracking under the pressure of his friends ganging up on him and grinning at him with their knowing smiles.

"Like her? Or _like _her, like her?"

"I _like_ her, like her, so what? Is that a crime now?" he asked, now a similar colour as to what Chris had been when he had left the room.

"Is what a crime?" asked Chris, rejoining the circle, looking an altogether better colour.

"NOTHING!" said Tom quickly.

"OK then," said Chris, slightly confused. "I just ran into Harry Stewart who was busy chatting up my sister, how gross is that?"

"It's not _that_ gross," said Katie, taking pity on Tom who was once again intently studying the pattern on his shoelaces.

"It is! That guy is a total spaz!" said Chris. "What's he even doing here?"

"He's a friend of one of my friends," said Mary, half apologetically.

"Oh whatever, the point is I sent her home," said Chris. "Or she would have missed her curfew. Plus I think she'd been drinking after I specifically told her not to."

"You know she actually might have listened to you if you hadn't have been holding a beer in your hand when you said it," said Benji.

"It's not the point, she should've done what I said, not what I did."

"You sound so much like my mom," said Mary.

"Come to think of it," said Chris, "I sound a lot like my mom as well, that can't be a good sign. The point is she shouldn't have been drinking because now mom is going to know she lied to her about going around to her friend's."

"Hey! Am I not her friend?" asked Benji, with mock hurt.

"Of course you are," said Chris, "But you know what I mean."

"Don't sweat it," said Katie. "I don't even think she was drinking."

"Yeah right," said Chris, "Have you met my sister?"

"Yes, I was talking to her about twenty minutes ago and she seemed perfectly sober."

"Really?"

"Yep."

"Wow, just when you think you know a person."

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"Hey I'm home!" said Patricia as she entered her house.

"Hey Trish," said Jason who was sitting in the living room.

"Where's mom?"

"In the attic with your aunts," said Jason.

"OK, thanks," she said and she climbed the stairs to the third story of the house. "Hey mom."

"Hey sweetie, did you have a good time?"

"A great time," she said, smiling. "I'm really wrecked though so I'm going to hit the sack."

"OK, night night," said Piper as did Paige and Phoebe.

"It's good that she's making friends," said Phoebe. "Especially on the first day, means she won't be stuck with out someone to sit with at lunch or anything."

"Oh look, he's waking up," said Paige.

"Where am I?" he asked, after shocking himself on the cage.

"I think you'll find that we're asking the questions here, thanks all the same," said Piper. "Now why did you attack us today?"

"I don't know what you mean."

Paige rolled her eyes. "You see, there are two ways we can do this, the easy way," she said. "Or the hard way." She moved one of the crystals before quickly putting it back in it's place, causing a surge in current which shocked the demon.

"Your choice."

"We wanted the book," said the demon, reluctantly.

"We know that," said Paige, moving the crystal again. "But _why_ are you after the book?"

"Why has every other demon came after the book before us?" the demon asked.

"I told you,_ we _are asking the qeustions," said Piper, as Paige moved the crystal in and out of its place once again.

"It was rhetorical!" protested the demon, who was by now looking altogether a little singed. "We wanted it so we could use it against other demons, make our mark on the Underworld."

"It has to be more than that," said Phoebe. "Surely every demon in the Underworld didn't decide they wanted to make their mark at the same time."

"How would I know? What other demons do is not my concern."

"Perhaps not," said Paige. "But I think you are still not telling us everything and when I feel like people aren't telling me everything I just have to . . ." The demon let out a yell of pain as the moved crystal triggered the cage to let out another electric shock.

"That's it," said the demon, "You are going to kill me anyway and I'm not going to tell you what you want so I might as well die on my own terms." With that he sent flames from his arms hurtling towards the cage, where it quickly rebounded and hit him square in the chest, causing him to explode in flames and leave nothing but a scorch mark.

"A fat lot of good that did us," said Phoebe, picking up the crystals and putting them back into their box.

"Not necessarily," said Piper. "He said he wasn't going to tell us what we wanted, proving there was more to tell, there must be a bigger plan in play here as we thought. We'll just have to keep at this with every demon attack. Eventually we'll have to capture a demon who cracks and tells us what we want to know."

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"Chris if you don't get up now mom is going to leave without you again."

"Go away!" he muttered, rolling over on his bed and shoving his head under his pillows. "And turn off the lights!"

"Chris, that's sunshine," said Patricia. "Trust me if I could have power over the weather I would but I don't so tough, now get up!"

Chris let out a moan of protest as his bed covers were wripped off him and flung on the floor. "That was so not cool," he said, trying his best to glare at his sister and squint at the same time, attempting to minimise the amount of light that managed to reach his eyes. "Here," said Patricia, handing him a glass of orange juice and two painkillers. "Take these, get washed, dressed and downstairs quickly before mom gets suspicious. By some miracle, you got away with everything last night but if you . . ."

"OK, OK, " said Chris, "I get it now leave me to attend to my wounds and get ready in peace."

"Your wounds?" asked Patricia.

"A particularly nasty incident during some mattress surfing down the stairs," explained Chris, wincing as he stood up.

"Isn't there a bookcase at the bottom of Benji's stairs?"

"Exactly."

"Ouch," sympathised Patricia.

"Exactly."

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**A/N:** Yet another reminder/apology that I don't have spell check and that no matter how many times I read through it I'm probably going to miss some typos so please alert me to any so I can fix them.

And yes I know this was another filler chapter but things start to kick off another little bit in the next chapter (fingers crossed) :S Then the middle of the story is quite plotty but then it settles back down to being quite relationshippy, but that's because of the plot. If you followed that you deserve an award cuz it's entirely possible I'm just rambling just for the sake of it. It's just that there are some smaller plotlines that need to be set up and it requires stupid chapters like this to do it. Ugh, I'm really not happy with this chapter so I am posting it quickly before I delete it and make a fresh attempt at it. So review only if you want, I won't take it personally.

**Kia- Kawaii Princess**: What do you mean I switched their personalities? Gah! (panics) It wasn't intentional! When and how did I make Wyatt 'cool' and Chris 'uncool'! Quick, tell me how to fix it! Thanks for the review and please do it again so I can fix it! Please help! This is exactly what I mean when I say that i hate this story cuz of it's annoyingness for not being up to its prequels standards.

**Flephanie: **Damn straight two reviews was the way to go! (Thanks) Well the Trish/Tom thing wasn't just your imagination as you can see, there will be more of that in the next chappie and well I am saving the Katie finding out thing for later on, but I didn't have her almost find out here just to mess with everyones minds, there is a reason but it's only going to become apparent like in the very last couple of chapters, you will just have to wait for that.

Thanks to **CharmedClover, ilovedrew88, hazza123, icantthinkofafnick, Samanth** and **Sparkling Cherries** for reviewing, I very much appreciated it.


	6. The Days when the Goose Fattens Up

**In Love, Actually.**

**Chapter Six: The Days When the Goose Fattens Up (aka Halloween is Coming)**

"So what do you guys want to do on Friday?" asked Chris, sitting down on the patch of grass he and his friends usually occupied during lunch.

"Dude, seriously, what is with you and Halloween?" asked Benji.

"Why do we have to go through this every year?" asked Chris, slightly annoyed that his friends weren't more enthusiastic about his favourite holiday. "Why can't you just accept that I'm really into Halloween? It was always a big deal in my house when I was a kid and it has just rubbed off on me I guess. It's only these past few years I've been allowed to celebrate it with my friends rather than my family, well other than the obligitory daytime celebrations and I don't see why you all can't just humour me!"

"Fine, fine, what do you want to do?" asked Katie, obligingly.

"There's a big Halloween party in Extreme," suggested Chris. "I've checked around and a decent enough crowd are going."

"OK," relented Katie, after a moment or two of deliberation. "I'm in, as long as there are no costumes."

"There aren't," laughed Chris. "So what about you two?"

"I can't," said Tom. "My mom and dad are going out so I have to babysit Kirsten."

"She's twelve!" protested Chris. "She can look after herself!"

"Try telling that to Crooks," said Tom.

"Who the hell is Crooks?" asked Katie.

"My mom's favourite ornamental dog in her ornamental dog collection who was cruely smashed before his time, coincidentally the last time Kirsten was left in the house by herself," said Tom.

"A dog?" asked Chris increduously. "An ornamental dog is the reason you can't party on Halloween, the greatest night of the year?"

"Afraid so," said Tom.

"I can't go either," said Benji.

"What!"

"I promised Mary I'd go with her to her friend's party."

"Whatever, your loss," said Chris. "Looks like it's just you and me," he said to Katie.

"Well it'll be fun," said Katie. "Besides when we get bored with each other's company I'm sure there will be plenty of other people there that we can talk to."

"Really?" asked Chris, "You know Kate, I don't think that's how these clubs work. I mean it's a pretty private deal, you are only allowed to talk to the people you arrive with, they're surprisingly strict about these sort of things. They even tag you, so that if you talk to anyone else, you get this electric shock that likes . . ." Katie playfully smacked him around his shoulder for making fun of her just as her cell phone began to ring. "Ooh, I've gotta take this, it's Wyatt," she said, getting up and walking away from her friends to answer it. "Hello? . . . Hey! How are you? . . . Good, me too, I just miss you that's all," they heard her say.

"Oh brother," said Chris, rolling his eyes.

"Your brother to be exact," said Benji, grinning.

"Ha ha," said Chris. "How wonderfully witty of you, you should do stand up."

"I prefer sit down actually," said Benji.

"Smart ass."

"So do you wanna hang out after school today?" asked Tom.

"I can't," said Chris, grimly. "I have tutoring with Claire, who is just super psyched to be helping me out with such a super subject like physics! I'm meeting her in the hall with the rest of the tutoring pairs at half three and she hopes that I will find the whole thing as super as she does!" said Chris, while putting on a wide, beaming smile and a high pitched voice before stretching out his face and glaring at his friends, daring them to laugh. "I mean it's so unfair, surprise pop quizes should not constitute as a test."

"Oh come on, cheer up," said Tom. "It will probably be way super-er than you think!" he said, adopting the same high pitch voice as Chris had used, along with the grin that is normally only induced by an overdose of serious anti-depressants.

"I could kill you with my thumbs you know," Chris warned.

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"We need to make another attack on the Charmed Ones soon," said one high ranked Filarka, Krut.

"But we don't want to attack them," argued Dadak, a Brughad demon. "We need them out of the way if we are to finish the pentagram ritual on the book."

"How do we even know this ritual of yours will even work?" asked Kuran, the Filarka leader.

"I could feel the protective magic surrounding the book that repels evil weakening," insisted Dadak.

"Either way, we need to get back on track," said Krut. "That was our last attempt at the book and many others have made their bid for the book since then."

"And they have all failed!" said another Brughad demon. "Patience could be our best option here. Let all the others go in and get themselves killed! All it is doing is narrowing down the competition for us! We seem to be the only ones who realise that the only way to get the book is with the Charmed Ones out of the house."

"Yes but we must learn from our mistakes and realise that it is not just the Charmed Ones we need out, but the whole family. The manor will need to be empty if we are ever to successfully complete the ritual," said Dadak.

"Indeed, but that is easier said than done," said Kuran. "There are so many of those blasted witches crammed into the house that I doubt it is ever completely empty for more than ten minutes."

"How long does the ritual take?" asked Krut.

"Fifteen, maybe twenty minutes," said a Brughad general, Makih, who was in charge of their rituals and who in fact had came up with this one. "The defensive magics on the Halliwell Book of Shadows are extremely powerful, they are an ancient form of magic that is extremely unique and therefore very difficult to break."

"Then why are we wasting our time on it?" growled Kuran.

"Settle Kuran," said Makih, "Difficult but I believe not impossible. We just need to use higher ranked demons in our clans next time."

"That would cause greater losses which would have a bigger impact for both of our clans if we were interrupted again by one of the witches," said Krut.

"If it pays off, however we both know the reward is more than worth it," said Dadak. "We just need to bide our time a little longer, make sure all of our demons are at full strength before we pick the five who should make the next attempt."

"Very well," agreed Kuran. "We shall wait."

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"Hey Piper," said Jason as he entered the manor living room.

"Hey, how are you?" asked Piper, looking up from her notebook.

"Good thanks," said Jason. "All ready for Friday?"

"Yeah, having a big bash at the club. Chris refuses to go though cause I made it fancy dress again this year," said Piper. "But like everyone else he will be there during the day for our normal Halloween rituals, you know educating all the local kids about the true meaning off Halloween via traditional fun and games."

"Sounds like fun so what are . . . DEMON!" Jason yelled frantically, making a dive for the floor.

Piper, sighed and without looking round, he simply flicked her wrist in the direction Jason's horrified expression had been looking and blew him up. "Sorry about that, you were saying?"

Still in shock, Jason picked himself up off the floor, his gaze fixated on where the demon had been. "Aren't you . . . didn't you . . . what about . . ." he stuttered. Piper gave a small, amused smile before clapping her hands together to snap him out of it. "Sorry," he said, still slightly dazed.

"No worries," said Piper. "So what were you saying before we were so rudely interrupted?"

"Oh I was just going to ask how your plans were going for the P3 restaurant."

"Not well," she said, rubbing her forehead. "I'd forgotten how tricky getting P3 up and running was. It's just that I started a club because it was cheaper than starting a restaurant, but P3's profit margins have been so good this past year or so, for the first time I really think I could do it."

"So what's the problem? I would have thought setting up a restaurant would be similar?" he asked.

"It is," said Piper, "My main problem at the moment is finding a suitable space."

"Ah, I anticipated that. I know the guy who owns that Italian restaurant a few doors down from P3 and well, nothing's official or anything, but he's thinking of selling," said Jason.

"Really?" asked Piper, excited. "Because that would be perfect! It's big, got a good clientelle and close enough to P3 that it would be associated with it and I could run back and forth!"

"I thought so," said Jason. "Which is why I told him that if he were going to sell it, you would be very interested so he promised to give you a call to give you first dibs if he does put it on the market."

"That's fantastic!" said Piper, getting up to hug her brother in law. "Thank you so much Jason! Ooh, I have to go tell Phoebe that she has impecible taste in men!"

"I've always thought she had," smirked Jason. The doorbell rang and he got up to answer it.

"Hey Mr. Dean, is Chris here?" Tom asked.

"He's just out running an errand with Paige but he will be back at any moment, do you want to come in and wait?" Jason offered.

"Sure, that'd be great thanks," said Tom, stepping into the manor.

"Take a seat, Tom," asaid Jason. "I'll just go call Paige on her cell, see whereabouts they are and just make sure they won't be much longer."

"Thanks." Tom sat down on the nearest seat and began twiddling his thumbs while generally looking around the room.

"Hey." Tom spun around in his seat to find Patricia joining him in the living room. "You waiting on Chris?" she asked, sitting down beside him.

"Yeah."

"In that case I'll just have to keep you company."

Meanwhile, Jason dialled the numbers for Paige's cell phone and Chris answered. "Paige Matthew's cell, this is Chris her favourite nephew speaking."

"Hey Chris, your friend Tom is here and I just wanted to see how much longer you were going to be," he said.

"Oh we're on our way back now, should be there in two or three minutes," said Chris.

"That's great," said Jason, "I'll let him know, see you soon, bye!" He hung up the phone and went back into the living room to find Patricia and Tom laughing about something. "He said he'll be here in a few minutes."

"Thanks, that's great Mr. Dean," said Tom politely.

"No problem," he said, walking out and towards the kitchen to talk to his wife.

A few minutes later, Chris and Paige came crashing throught the front door in a fully heated debate about the modern music scene. "What do you mean Koala suck! They're one of my favourite bands of the moment! Their latest album was a slice of guitar rifting genius!" insisted Chris.

"Oh please! All bands nowadays suck!" said Paige. "I mean at least you are into the classics as well but there are too many teenagers running about thinking that Koala are original and that there has never been anything like them before. I mean hello, have they never heard of a little thing I like to call the 1980's?"

"You are just getting old," he taunted, "But we'll finish this later," Chris promised, turning into the living room as Paige headed for the kitchen. "Hey guys."

"Uh hey Chris," said Tom, slightly nervously while Patricia gave a small wave. Chris frowned and surveyed the scene in front of him with the detail of a crime scene investigator. He noticed that Patricia was looking slightly flushed and Tom seemed noticeably paler than usual. Suddenly a sense of deja vu hit him, he'd seen this before only with a different sibling and a different friend and that was in his bedroom back in March. "You two are seceretly dating!" he proclaimed.

"What!" yelped Tom, springing further away from Patricia. "No we're not!"

"Well you were making out then because I know those looks!" said Chris, slightly hysterical. "I saw those looks on Wyatt and Katie after I'd just walked in on, well tumbled in on actually, I was coming through the window," he explained. "But that's not the point!" he rambled on. "She was looking all red and he was all pale because they'd just been seceretly kissing!"

"Chris . . ." started Patricia.

"Oh no! Don't you 'Chris . . .' me missy! I've had enough of those 'Chris'' to last me a lifetime thank you very much! I mean don't get me wrong, I love my friends, they're great but just as that, friends!" By this point he was practically shrieking and he had taken to frantically pacing back and forth in front of the couple, who were to afraid to do anything but sit and listen. "I just don't want to be brother-in-law to all of them one day!"

"Um, don't you think you're getting a little ahead of yourself there?" asked Tom.

"No!" screeched Chris. "I mean have you seen Katie and Wyatt recently? 'Oh Wyatt you hang up first!' 'No you!' 'Nuh uh, you! Cause I love you more!' 'Don't think so I love you more,'" said Chris, jumping back and forth acting it out before doubling over and making sick sounds. "And just how long have you been seceretly kissing!" he demanded to know.

"A good two minutes now," said Patricia.

"TWO MINUTES!" squawked Chris, who appeared to be outraged at this revelation. "A full two minutes! I can't believe this is happening!" He sat down and put his head in his hands, giving Patricia and Tom time to exchange nervous looks. Chris looked up, a new course of action decided upon, he jumped to his feet. "I'm going to kill you," he said determinedly to Tom as he took huge, menacing strides across the living room towards him.

"Woah Chris, slow down there for like two minutes," said Tom, leap-froging over the back of the sofa to get away from his furious friend.

"TWO MINUTES!" Chris howled. "Do you know any other period of time?" he asked as he chased him into the hall until they were both at opposite sides of the table. More deja vu, this was becoming increasingly uncanny.

"Chris calm down," said Patricia who had followed them out to the hall where she was standing with her arms folded, tapping her foot with an impatient expression. 'Boys!' she thought in exsasperation while rolling her eyes.

"Calm down?" asked Chris as though it was the most ridiculous request he's ever heard. He turned back to Tom. "How am I supposed to calm down when you two have been making out! That's my baby sister!"

"I know!" said Tom. "And I'm sorry, I really am, but she also happens to be your really cool and extremely pretty baby sister." He let out a yelp for not having recognised his mistake before and raced around the table as Chris made another run for him. Chris subtley waved his fingers, telekinetically tripping up Tom, who fell to the floor and skidded to a halt at the bottom of the stairs.

"I saw that," said Patricia angrily as she headed towards Tom but Chris got there first where he pinned him to the ground and raised his clenched fist. "Chris let him go," Patricia warned, her teeth gritted as she glared at her brother.

Chris looked at Tom, then Patricia back to Tom. "If you hurt her . . ."

"I swear on my life, I won't even look at her sideways in a way that could even possibly be misconstrewed as hurtful," said Tom, quickly, already half wincing in preparation for Chris' fist making contact with his face. He'd never before been on the receiving end of one of Chris' punches before but having obsevrved them, he had never wanted to. Chris sighed before getting up and offering his hand out to aid Tom. Tom suspiciously gripped Chris' hand and was surprisngly helped up rather than dropped back to the ground. "Sorry," muttered Chris, running a hand through his hair distractedly, while examining the ground.

"Thank God!" said Patricia. "Did you loose your freaking mind!"

"We're not quite at the stage where you get to be mad at me yet," said Chris, who was still looking rather traumatised.

"Oh please!" said Patricia. "It's getting to the point that you are going to be known as 'The Over-reacting Halliwell,' rather than the 'Most Sarcastic Halliwell,' title that you currently hold."

"I don't over-react!" insisted Chris.

"Hmmph!" said Tom.

Chris spun on his heels and glared at his friend. "OK now I know, that _you_ aren't saying anything else that is going to annoy me quite yet."

"Sorry," Tom practically whispered, once again looking down at his feet.

"So how exactly do you suggest we figure this out?" asked Patricia.

"Well," said Chris, "In the spirit of deja vu, we're going to sit down and use 'the tools.'"

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"So how's school going, how much trouble have you got yourself into since last time we talked?" asked Wyatt. It was Wednesday night and he had orbed home to pick up his laundry and some dinner left-overs but had decided to check in with Chris to see what he'd missed out on in the last few weeks or so.

"Not too much," said Chirs. "A couple of detentions here and there but not for anything major. Oh did you hear about my Physics tutor?"

"No!" said Wyatt. "You are getting extra physics lessons? Isn't that like . . ."

"My own personal hell, yes yes," said Chris. "But the girl who is tutoring me, is the most melting person I have ever met. Then again what can you expect from someone who offers to tutor people in physics? Her name is Claire and she's so chirpy, she actually enjoys Physics and she keeps putting her name in every other sentance!"

"What do you mean?" asked Wyatt, intrigued.

"Like last week, I was in a bad mood and when I sat down I said, 'Right, let's just get this over with.' So she goes 'Aww, is little Chrissy in a bad mood?' I could've killed her there, but oh no, she went on to say, 'You know what you need, some TLC, a little Tender Loving Claire!' Then she got up and hugged me. I wanted to barf." He shuddered at the memory.

"Oh my God, this girl is hilarious!" said Wyatt who was laughing.

"You know I_ may _have cracked a smile the first time but by the end of the lesson when she is 'claire-ifying' things for me instead of normal regular clarifying I'm more than a little irritated," said Chris, whose irritation was increasing with Wyatt laughing, clearly unable to comprehend his brother's plight. "I really think I am going to loose my mind between Physics tutoring, Mom reminding me every five minutes that I'm helping out on Friday in P3, Petulia constantly singing Halloween songs, especially that one about how the goose is getting fat and the old beggar man."

"So what's going on with everyone else?" asked Wyatt, after he'd stopped laughing.

"Well, Benji is fine, nothing really new with him, you speak to Katie more often than I do and Tom," said Chris, pausing for effect. "Is dating our little sister."

"What? When did that happen?" asked Wyatt, who was more than taken back.

"I'm not even sure," said Chris. "I walked in after they'd been kissing last night, _supposedly_ for the first time but who knows."

"Let me guess, you over-reacted," said Wyatt.

"I DO NOT OVER REACT!" yelled Chris.

"No, you're right, you take things calmly and react the perfect amount," said Wyatt, rolling his eyes.

"I'm just sick of people telling me I over react," said Chris in an futile attempt to defend his outburst.

"You chased him around the table, didn't you?" asked Wyatt, though it was more of a rhetorical question because he was relatively sure that he already knew the answer. Well, what the truthful answer.

"No . . ." Chris was avoiding making eye contact with his brother. He looked up, "Maybe . . . oh all right I did but he deserved it!"

"Like I deserved it?"

"More than you deserved it, that's why I pinned him to the ground and came pretty close to punching him."

"Well I suppose he was macking on our baby sister."

"Exactly!" said Chris.

"I'm definitely going to have to have a word with him about that," said Wyatt, planning this threatening talk in his head.

A knock on the door interrupted their conversation and Chris yelled, "Come in!" The door to their bedroom swung open and to both their surprise it was Katie. "Oh my God Wyatt!" she squealed, upon recognising him and running towards him and flinging her arms around him.

"Uh, Katie hey," he said as she stood up. He quickly flicked his wrists and froze her. "What are you doing here?" he asked the frozen Katie.

"MOM!" bellowed Chris. As he got up to the door he came pretty close to banging into Katie.

"Chris! Watch out! You could have unfroze her," said Wyatt.

"Woah, sorry," said Chris.

"It's fine, just be more more Claire-ful in future."

"That's so not funny," said Chris, glaring at him.

"I beg to differ," said Wyatt, who was quietly chuckling at what he regarded as his own comic genius.

"What?" asked Piper, entering the room a minute later. "Oh dear," she said upon noticing Katie. "Wyatt I didn't know you were still here! I thought you orbed out a while ago!"

"I was going to until I sensed Chris orbing in so we came up here to catch up!" said Wyatt. "Now I am going to have to explain why I am home and didn't tell her, this is just great."

"I'm so sorry," said Piper. "I would never have let her in if I'd known you were still here."

"Uh, duh!" said Chris.

"On the brightside you'll get to spend some time with her," said Piper.

"OK, just go so I can unfreeze her," said Wyatt. Piper apologised again before leaving the room. "Ready?" he asked Chris as he got back into his previous position.

"Yep," said Chris, doing the same.

Wyatt flicked his wirsts again, reanimating Katie. "What are you doing here?" she asked him.

"Uh I decided to skip my last few days of classes and come home for the Halloween weekend," he said, thinking quickly. He could always tell her that he was doing family things when he orbed out to attend class.

"Why didn't you tell me?" she asked, sitting herself down in his lap, her arms still securely around his neck.

"I, uh, wanted it to be a surprise, I was going to call you once I'd unpacked," he said.

"Where are your bags?"

"I just finished unpacking so I put them away," stuttered Wyatt.

"Well I'm definitely surprised," she said. "I didn't even see your car outside."

"I, uh . . . "

"He car pulled!" jumped in Chris. "He car pulled with a friend who also decided to come home for the Halloween weekend, he dropped him off about half an hour ago."

"Yeah, that sounds about right," said Wyatt, silently thanking his brother. "So what are we doing on Halloween?"

"Well me and Chris were going to go the party in Extreme if you are up for it," said Katie, happily.

"Yeah, sounds good," said Wyatt.

"Well count me out," said Chris.

"Why? Come on I haven't been out with you in ages," said Wyatt.

"No, I'm really not in the mood to be third wheeling it, thanks all the same," said Chris, feeling slightly awkward.

"You wouldn't be the third wheel!" said Katie.

"How do you figure?"

"Well that's why I was coming over, to see if you minded if my cousin Rachel tagged along. She's no plans cause her friends aren't really up for doing anything so I said she could come with us as long as you didn't mind."

"Yeah, right," said Chris.

"No really," insisted Katie, "I was talking to her on the phone last night. Which totally works out cause now it is just four friends hanging out."

Chris deliberated over this for a few moments, "OK then, but if this 'cousin' of yours doesn't show, because you've made her up, I am so outta there."

"Deal," said Katie. "And I haven't made her up and she does want to go."

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"Rachel please you gotta go!"

"But Katie I already have plans!"

Katie sighed. After leaving the manor she had came straight home to ring her cousin Rachel and beg her to come out with them on Friday night. She didn't want to leave Chris out, it was his favourite holiday and Wyatt's as well.

"Rachel you don't understand!" pleaded Katie, down the phone.

"What's not to understand?" asked Rachel. "You made plans with your boyfriend's brother, now your boyfriend's home and you want to hang with him instead so you are trying to fob off the younger brother on me!"

"It's not like that at all, I just don't what Chris to feel left out!" said Katie.

"How is that different?"

"Come on, you'll have fun I know you will, they are both great guys to hang around with on a night out. It's going to be really casual and you can stay over at mine like we did in the old days and catch up, we never talk anymore."

"That's because we don't go to the same school any more, I finished junior high, the year after you went to a different high school than me and we just went our separate ways."

"I'm well aware of that so, please, for me? For old time's sake?" asked Katie.

"I can hear you pouting over the phone," laughed Rachel. "Fine, I'll come over to yours about seven to get ready," said Rachel, relenting.

"Oh thank you, thank you, thank you!" chirped Katie into the receiver.

"But you owe me one."

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"Well it looks like I'm staying here for a couple of days," said Wyatt, after making some calls to his room mates at college.

"Oh I'm so glad," said Piper, hugging her eldest son.

"So what demon do we have here?" asked Chris, noticing the demon in the crystal cage.

"Don't know, he isn't in the book," said Phoebe.

"That's unusual," said Wyatt.

"Yeah, Paige went back to Magic School to check the books there," said Piper.

"I'll go see if she wants any help," said Chris, orbing out after taking a good look at the demon.

"You know if you actually let him go to Magic School he would be the world's biggest nerd," said Wyatt.

"So Mr. Demon, when you going to tell us what we want to know?" asked Piper, ignoring this remark.

"Never!" growled the demon.

Half an hour later, Paige and Chris returned with a book. "Mosi demon, energy balls, blah blah blah but more interestingly, has a fear of water," announced Chris proudly.

"A fear of water?" asked Phoebe, disbelieving.

"Yep," said Paige. "Wierd, I know."

"OK then," said Wyatt, conjuring a glass of water.

"Wyatt!" scolded Piper. "Was that really necessary? It would have taken an extra minute to go downstairs and get one! How many times must I warn you about personal gain with your conjuring power?"

"Sorry, but it's here now so can we just threaten him with it?"

"Fine, threaten away," said Piper, folding her arms.

"OK, Mr. Mosi," said Wyatt, stepping closer to the demon. "So you tell us what's going on in the Underworld and you don't get wet." When the demon only glared, Wyatt tipped the glass a little so a few drops hit the floor surrounding the demon who immediately shot back to the other side of the cage to get away from it.

"The Council!" the demon yelped.

"What Council?" asked Phoebe.

"The demon High Council," said the Mosi demon, whose eyes were fixated on the few water droplets that were a few inches away from him. "They issued a decree that said whoever brought them the Charmed One's Book of Shadows would be rewarded with a place on its council."

"Why do so many demons want this spot?" asked Piper.

The demon fell silent again. "Wyatt, splash him," ordered Piper.

"Power!" said the demon quickly as Wyatt moved to tip the glass. "A place on the High Council grants you extra powers."

"What sort of extra powers?" asked Paige. The demon grew quiet once again so Wyatt poured the water over him. The demon let out a yell of pain before his skin started to bubble until finally the demon exploded in flames.

"Oops?" said Wyatt.

"Apparently that fear of water wasn't so wierd after all," said Chris.

"It would seem so," said Phoebe.

"Ugh, now we are going to have to wait for the next demon attack to find out more!" said Piper who was by now rather frustrated.

"Meh, the five minute break before that happens will do us good," said Paige, causing everyone other than Piper to break out in a smile.

"It make me nervous that we haven't heard of this Council before," said Phoebe.

"Me too," said Paige. "I mean if this many demons want a spot on it, it must me pretty prestigious. Sounds like it has been around for a very long time."

Piper, sighed, "That's true, I'm also pretty sure that there is nothing about them in the book, which means . . ."

"Magic School," said Paige. "I'll gather a team of students who are looking to pick up some extra credit to start looking," she said, orbing out.

"Look, I need the practise as I'm probably getting a little rusty so how about now that we know the specifics of what we're interrogating about, I head down to the Underworld, do a little re-con and see what I can find out?" suggested Wyatt.

"I'll go with," said Chris. "I have some venting to do."

"All right!" said Wyatt, felicitously while giving Chris an entusiastic high five. "The ultimate demon fighting team back together at last!"

Piper and Phoebe raised an eyebrow at him, offended looks at the ready.

"Apart from the Power of Three obviously," he said quickly.

"But that just goes without saying," added Chris, with what he hoped was an extremely humble look, it was unlikely though as he had never managed to pull it off before.

"Obviously," said Piper, after finally cracking a smile, "Fine, go, just . . ."

"Be careful," said Chris and Wyatt in unison, with a similar grin. "We know," said Wyatt, "And we will."

"Always are," said Chris.

"Pah!"

With a last grin, the two brothers orbed out.

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**A/N:** OK, so this chapter was originally like way longer but I then realised that I had even more stuff to put in it, so I just cut it off here and will put everything else into the next chapter.

Just in case you hadn't noticed, I changed my pen name, (reasons can be found on my profile) but I promise it is still me.

Also I meant to say this in the last chapter, directed towards all the American readers. In case you didn't know, I'm from N. Ireland, UK and have only the vaguest idea of how your schooling system works. So any mistakes just pretend that they change the system in the future.

The above actually kind of applies to everything, if somethings wrong, just assume it's different in the future. If this loophole doesn't work for something, please tell me and I will fix it.

Now on to the reviewers you wonderful people! I really appreciate your support, especially for the last chapter cause I was feeling kinda crap over it and you guys just lifted me right up again so thanks so much! I apologise once again for the lack of plot in this chappie also but that is really only because I had to split it in two as I said above.

**Flephanie**: Quadruple physics! Stares in horror That's illegal! Thankfully I will never have to sit through that, hell I never have to go to physics again! C'est fantastique! Anyway, I just spelt Smyth with a y because my teacher spells it with a y. Though my cousins who are Smiths spell it with an i. I wasn't aware it was an Irish thing. And no I'm not going to tell you why it's important. Well it's not so much 'important,' as . . . actually no. I'm not telling you anymore. Thanks for the review!

**Kia-Kawaii Princess: **Phew! Are you sure it's fixed? You are not saying it just because you are a little afraid of me now are you? Anyway, thanks for reviewing.

**IcantthinkofaFnick**: Did Chris freak out enough for you? grins And more Tom/Trish action in the next chapter, I hope, chapters tend to run away from me. And concerning the whole shipping issue I had my mind made up way before I even started this fic so one way or another I'm not being swayed by the reviewers, though there are a few twists, turns and bumps along the way. Thanks for reviewing, please continue to do so!

**Bec7012**: Thanks, I made sure to have Wyatt in a decent amount of this chapter because I know a lot of people love the Wyatt/Chris banter which is kind of hard to have without Wyatt. (Funny that, lol.) Anyway, so no need to miss him this chapter.

**Chiara Storm:** Tee hee! Picking up malteasers? I'm going to have to remember that. That bit was semi-autobiographical in a way cuz me and my friends are forever doing that only my stairs are pretty narrow so we blow up a lilo and put it in a smooth sleeping bag. Once there was a desk in the hall at the bottom of the stairs because some guy was coming to pick it up but we only realised half way down and crashed into it. I think I still have bruises. As for Physics it is my most hated subject, yes but I never have to do it again, yay! The three things Chris had learnt were pretty much what I knew until like the week before my Physics GCSE when I started cramming like mad. Attempting two years worth of work in a few days wasn't the best idea. Anyway, I'm going to stop now seeing as this is almost as long as the chapter so to sum up; thanks for the review!

Also a huge thanks to **Maggie0, hazza123, Samantha, Sparkling Cherries, ilovedrew88, Gilmore-Buffy-Fan13 **and** fallen angel06** for their reviews! They kept me going!


	7. Halloween

**In Love, Actually**

**Chapter 7: Halloween**

****

**A/N:** there are so many mistakes in this chapter but it's like 2am and I'm very tired. Please don't judge me.

Chris waved his hand and sent one of the energy balls that was flying towards him at one of the demons before quickly ducking to avoid another. Standing up again, he telekinetically flung a few more demons into walls and each other before quickly looking around to check how Wyatt was doing. He seemed to have things under control so Chris called for an athame of one demon before orbing in behind him and stabbing him in the back, vanquishing him in a roar of flames.

Wyatt meanwhile was exploding demons left and right and throwing the odd energy ball. A few minutes and several demons later Wyatt and Chris were suddenly alone in the cave.

"Wyatt!" protested Chris. "You can't keep vanquishing the last few! We need to keep at least one alive to ask about the COuncil!"

"Sorry," said Wyat, sheepishly. "I keep getting carried away. I forgot what an adrenaline rush this was."

"Well I think we've got as much information as we're going to get for one outing anyway," said Chris. "We better get you home before you become a total adrenaline junkie."

They orbed out and back to the manor and found Paige orbing in books from Magic School. "Hey guys, find out anything?"

"Yeah actually," said Wyatt. "We got it out of this one demon with horns that the High Council consists of five demons that are each elected through a trial of some sort, in this case, a rat race to get our book."

"We also heard whisperings down there that they meet once a month in a seceret location on the surface so if we could narrow it down to when, we could be in with a chance of finding them," added Chris. "So what about you, did you get any info?"

"Well my extra credit students found all these books and said that there were somethings in them about the High Council but not enough to give us something to go on but I decided to check them out myself, just to be thourough."

"Good thinking, I can help you with that," said Chris, picking up a near by book and sitting down on the sofa.

"They said they are going to keep looking for more," said Paige. "So we might still hit lucky."

"Im going to go tell mom and Pheebs what we found out," said Wyatt, going downstairs.

"Alright!" said Paige, "Just me and you kiddo, no friends waiting in the living room to bail you out this time and I'm fully prepared so the Koala slash today's music scene debate rages on!"

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"Do you remember that time we were down at the lake and we were playing hide and seek and you hid for a whole hour, unaware that I'd given up twenty minutes in and went to get some lunch?" asked Rachel.

"Yes, it was awful," laughed Katie. "You can put all of you stuff here," she said, making space on her bedroom floor, amongst all of the clothes, books, magazines and cds that cluttered her room.

"Thanks," said Rachel, putting her bags down before going over to the dressing table. She picked up a few of the framed photos there, examining them one by one. "Is this your boyfriend?" she asked, holding a picture of Katie and Wyatt, where Wyatt has his arms wrapped protectively around her.

"On and off for about eight months now," said Katie who was tidying up in a last minute attempt to make the room habitable.

"He is seriously cute!"

"I know," said Katie, grinning.

"Great so while you are spending the night with this guy, I'm stuck babysitting his little bro," Rachel said, slighlty huffily, sitting emphatically down on the bed, still enviously studying the photograph in her hand.

"OK, first of all, Chris is my age and secondly, he's not exactly ugly," said Katie, rolling her eyes at her cousin's doubtful expression.

"Oh don't tell me you dated him too!" said Rachel, her eyes twinking with amusement as she teased her.

"No!" laughed Katie. "Not that I didn't want to when we were like twelve! Oh you should have seen me, I was so pathetic! I followed him around like a love sick puppy but thankfully he never noticed or else I'd still be living it down!"

"Guys!" exclaimed Rachel. "Completely clueless!"

"Well in this case I'm not complaining," said Katie. "Nevertheless I'm sure you'll enjoy his company and find him rather . . ."

"Annoying?"

"I was going to say charming," said Katie, shaking her head. "So are you alright sleeping in here? Cause my parents are out of town so you could stay in there room."

"No, in here is fine," insisted Rachel. "After all, it wouldn't be the same if I was in a different room."

"I suppose."

"So if Auntie Karen and Uncle Bob are out of town shouldn't you be throwing a rager?"

"Yes but last time a lot of things ended up broken and I ended up grounded for a very long time," said Katie. "The wounds need to heal before I have a party they don't kno about again."

"Wimp," joked Rachel. She got up off the bed and walked back over to the dressing table to replace the photograph. She picked up another, "Ooh, who's this guy? Me like!"

Katie walked over to see what she was holding and smiled. "That, would be Chris," she said, admiring the picture which had been taken during the summer. It showed Katie dripping wet, getting a piggyback ride courtesy of Chris. Both were smiling, their faces side by side as she clung to him, her arms around his neck and his arms around her legs, holding them in pace around his waist. She smiled at the memory of the water fight and her ensuing ride on the 'Halliwell Express.'

"The little brother?" asked Rachel, disbelieving.

"Yes, so to speak," laughed Katie. "And for the record he's not exactly little, he's six foot one."

"Nice height," remarked Rachel. "It's a shame he's only sixteen."

"Why cause otherwise you'd have your wicked way with him?" teased Katie.

"Maybe," said Rachel, smiling.

"Oh please you are like one year older than him! That's nothing!"

"I'm eighteen!" protested Rachel.

"Yeah, eighteen and a few weeks!" Katie reminded her. "And Chris is seventeen in three months or so! He's even your type, the brooding bad boy, so to speak. He gets himself into more trouble than you could even dream of! Come on this would be perfect!"

"Sorry," said Rachel. "But I just don't think so, he'd do for a bit of eye candy, you know something pretty to look at, but nothing more."

"Spoil sport," muttered Katie as she flung some of the clothes on the floor into the bottom of her wardrobe to make space.

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It was Thurday night and the compulsory family dinner was in full swing. Everyone was in a good mood, mainly due to having Wyatt home and the upcoming Halloween celebrations, also Paige and Adam had just announed that they had set the date for their wedding. It was to take place in early June. Piper was shocked at this revelation and had gave them a lecture about how much planning they were going to have to do in a relatively short amount of time. She had managed to rise the panic levels in the couple but had just as quickly lowered them by presenting them with the wedding planner scrapbook she had been making for the past month or so. Adam had hugged her for a very long time.

"Thank you so much Piper," he said, letting go of her when her oxygen supply started to become an issue.

"You are entirely welcome," said Piper. "Both of you, I'm just so happy for you two! I love a good wedding and I had a feeling that being the spacers you sometimes are you would probably leave things to the last minute and figured that one of us might as well be prepared."

"I resent that!" protested Paige. "But thank you all the same," she added when Piper raised an eyebrow. "I don't know what you are chuckling at," she playfully snapped at Chris. "After all if we are spacers that would make you our King."

"I have no problems with that," said Chris. "Now as your King I order you to bring me some pudding and shine my crown for me."

"I feel a revolution coming on," said Paige.

"Don't be ridiculous sweetheart," said Adam, putting an arm around her. "We'll probably space out and forget to do it."

"Then be upset when I don't do it for you," said Piper.

"That's so mean!" whined Paige. "Why won't you overthrow the Spacer King for us?"

"Because I have better things to do with my time than organise a pretend revolution to overthow a pretend King of a pretend people. Especially when that King is my own son!"

"Oh so this is what this is about, favouritism!" said Adam with mock anger and disgust. "What aboutyour political beliefs? To think that I've always thought of you as a person of substance!"

"You two really are perfect for each other, you know that," chimed in Phoebe.

"Yeah, that's why I'm marrying her," said Adam, kissing his fiancee on the forehead and pulling her closer to him.

"I thought it was for the regular nookie," joked Paige.

"Mom!" yelled a traumatised Petulia.

"Oh please, I was only joking," she said. "He already gets the regular nookie."

Groans around the table were let out from the teenagers, especially Petulia who had stormed into the kitchen with a look of horror on her face, while the adults laughed.

"You guys realy underestimate how gross it is when you people say stuff like that in front of us," said Polly, shaking her head.

"Actually I think we know exactly how much it grosses you out, that's why we do it," said Piper.

"In that case," said Patricia who burst into song. "Patty and Victor, up a tree, F-U-C-..."

"PATRICIA!" yelled Piper and Leo at the same time, causing their daughter to stop her song and it was now the teenage Halliwell's turn to laugh.

"See, it's not very nice, is it?" she asked, folding her arms with a smirk on her face.

"We were yelling because of your foul language and you know it," said Leo.

"You interrupted me before it got 'foul'," Patricia reminded him.

"A technicality missy," scolded Piper. "And you three can look those looks of your faces right now!" Piper warned her sons and niece who were more than amused at Patricia's outburst. "Cursing is not big, it's not clever . . ."

"But it is damn funny," said Chris.

"To your room!" ordered Piper, at her wit's end. "I will not have you condoning your sister's crudeness. _Now Christopher_."

Chris got up from the table still grinng, "So totally worth it," he muttered to Wyatt as he passed him on his way to the stairs.

"Trish you are going to do all the clearing up after dinner before going to your room as well," said Piper.

"Oh it's alright when you make jokes but when I do it . . ." argued Patricia.

"Patricia, don't push your mom any firther for one night, OK?" said Leo gently.

Patricia rolled her eyes before getting up and beginning to clear the plates away as the other adults hid their amsued smiles from the fuming eldest Charmed One.

Later on, Piper called a family meeting to discuss their current demon situation. "I've been thinking about this for a while and I think we should split the family into two teams; Book Protectors and Council Investigators."

"I wanna be on the blue team!" said Chris excitedly causing everyone to laugh except Piper who glared at her son.

"The Book Protectors will be in charge of finding new ways to keep the book secure, you know protection spells, shield charms that sort of thing. They will also be the people who will primarily responf when a demon makes an attempt on the book," explained Piper. "The Council Investigators will be in charge of doing research on the Council, going through the books in Magic School, doing re-con in the Underworld, trying to find out who are on the council, what they do, what powers they have, etc. Everyone on board?"

"Yeah sounds great Piper," said Leo. "I'll be an Investigator, I can keep conferring with the Elders and ask my charges if they've ever heard of them."

"Good," said Piper. "I'll be a Protector."

"I'll take Book Protection also," said Phoebe.

"Are you sure it wouldn't be better if you did investigation?" asked Paige. "I mean sweetie you're over six monts pregnant, I think it would be best if you spent most of the time at Magic School."

"I agree," said Jason.

"Well I can do book protection from Magic School," argued Phoebe. "You know researching spells and charms that could be useful."

"Fine," said Piper, "As long as that's all you do. Now what would the rest of you prefer?"

"Investigation," said Wyatt. "I can't really orb home everytime a demon attacks but I can orb to the Underworld in my spare time."

"I'll take investigation because I spend a lot of time in Magic School anyway and have some reliable demon contacts," said Chris. "Plus I generally prefer to take the offensive approach than defensive."

"Ditto to everything Chris just said," Paige said.

"That's good," said Piper. "You can be head investigator."

Paige smiled and stuck her tounge out at Chris. "Who's King now?"

"Still me."

The rest of the family were sorted into the two teams so that Piper, Phoebe, Patricia, Adam and Petulia were Protectors and Paige, Leo, Wyatt, Chris, Polly and Jason were Investigators. Jason had insisted he wanted to help and they figured there was nothing stopping him from going though books, plus it meant he could spend time at Magic School with Phoebe constructively.

"I think everyone should also step up training," suggested Leo. "I was thinking of maybe starting to give a weekly lesson for all the whitelighters in the family, you know fine tuning things like glamouring, hovering, invisibility for Chris and Trish and even helping them to learn to heal. Things that could come in handy."

"Sounds fun," said Paige. "I mean I can only heal scrapes and small cuts which aren't much use to anybody. Lord knows it's about time I move up a bit."

"I'll draw up the new training timetable and we can impliment it from Monday onwards," said Phoebe.

"Super!" said Polly with fake entusiasm. At least she'd have one less class than the rest of her cousins though she knew she'd gladly go to the extra class if it meant she coud orb. 'Stupid half whitelighters!' she thought, glaring at her cousins.

"Well I gotta go," said Wyatt. "I'm late to meet Katie."

"Have fun!" Piper called after him.

"I'm heading out as well," said Chris, getting up.

"Me too," Patricia said.

"Oh I don't think so," said Piper. "Not after your performance at dinner tonight. I think your time would be much better spent getting a head start on your assignments."

"Mom that's not fair!" said Patricia.

"That's why it's called a punishment," said Piper. "It comes from the Latin term, 'Don't anger me again.'"

"Do we have to start?" Petulia asked.

"Oh no, you can go watch TV or whatever you want," said Piper.

"Hey!" preotested Paige. "Don't parent my child! Yes Tuli, you can go watch TV or whatever you want."

"Feel better?" Piper asked.

"Much."

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Friday was the day the Halliwells had been waiting for: Halloween. The entire family was buzzing and they had spent the day helping Piper out at P3 with her daytime celebrations. Then everyone had came back to the manor to do a few rituals out of respect for the day and to allow everyone to get ready for whatever their night plans entailed. For the adults it meant going to the party at P3 and the younger Halliwells all had their own plans. Patricia was going around to Tom to 'keep him company,' (Chris and Wyatt had begged her not to tell them anymore), Polly and Petulia were going to sleepovers and the boys were going to the Halloween party at Extreme, or as they had told Piper and Leo, 'to a friend's house to watch some old horror movies.'

Chris of course had managed to get himself in trouble for teaching Petulia and Polly how to make the broom fly. If it wasn't for the fact it was Halloween, he knew he wouldn't have gotten out of the house but as it was Piper was om a forgiving mood.

Extreme was jumping that night; there were so many people crammed into it Wyatt was sure they were violating fire safety regualtions. "You are not allowed to help mom at the club any more," said Chris. There were fake cobwebs hanging down from the bar and cardboard bats, pumpkins and witches hung on the walls. There were flickering laterns on shelves creating an eerie atmosphere that was perfect for the celebration. The music was good and they kept running into people they knew and were all in all having a great time.

"Having fun?" Katie asked Rachel, to confirm her suspicions.

"Oh, ever so much," she said sarcastically before letting out a laugh. "I actually am, Wyatt and Chris really are very funny, like your own personal double act."

"You see," said Katie.

"I'm still not hooking up with Chris though," said Rachel, shattering the smile on Katie's face.

"But why not?" Katie whined. "You think he's hot and funny! What more do you want?"

"He's a little weird for my liking."

"You're only saying that because when you two met, you said hello and he greeted you by poking you in the arm a couple of times to check you were real and not an illusion!" said Katie rationally.

"And that doesn't seem odd to you, how?" Rachel asked.

"He thought I was making you up to spare his feelings!" said Katie. "Come on, give me a perfectly good reason and I'll drop it."

"He's too young for me," insisted Rachel, "And I don't know, cousins dating brothers? It would just be too strange."

"What would be strange?" asked Wyatt when him and Chris returned with a fresh round of drinks.

"If lizards ruled with world," said Katie, taking a few sips of her drink before leaping to her feet. "I love this song!" she announced before heading to the dance floor and Wyatt obediently followed.

Chris sat on the bar stool, watching Wyatt and Katie as they slow-danced. He gazed at Katie and realised how happy she looked in his brother's arms. As Wyatt leant down for a kiss, Chris snapped out of his trance and gave a small shudder.

Rachel raised her eyebrows in surprise upon noticing this, "Don't tell me bad boy Chris is a prude!"

Chris laughed at this idea, "No it's nothing like that. It's just that Wyatt's my brother and I've known Katie for so long she can feel like my little sister at time," he improvised. "So them together is still a little weird for me, you know?"

"No offence but you're not exactly looking at my cousin in a sisterly way," observed Rachel, who was flashing him a knowing smile, which caused Chris to blush slightly and shift uncomfortably on the bar stool. "So spill."

Chris slumped onto the bar, burying his head in his hands in a vain attempt to hide his embarrassment. "I don't know what's came over me recently! Katie is my best friend, I've never thought about her like that but ever since her and Wyatt got together . . . I've been a little jealous," he admitted, deciding to phrase his feelings mildly.

"Ah," said Rachel understandingly. "T.G.S."

"Excuse me?" said Chris, confused.

"Typical Guy Syndrome," Rachel explained, an amused smile in place. "Always wanting what you can't have. I mean Katie was a friend, fair game, suddenly she's out of bounds when she starts dating your brother and so naturally you want her now_ because _she's out of bounds." She leaned back in a self-satisfied manner as Chris comtemplated her theory.

"This explains so much," he said.

"I know," said Rachel. "Don't worry, it's very common and also treatable. Just play the field a bit, stop moping around and in another few months you'll be cured! Besides if it helps, I'm sure if you really wanted her that badly, you could be in with a chance." Chris raised a doubtful but questioning eyebrow. "She admitted to me today that she used to have a crush on you."

"She did?" Chris asked, surprised. Rachel nodded. "Well at least now I can blackmail her to ensure she never calls my Christabella again," he muttered.

"OK, I'm bored making enlightening comments now," said Rachel, finishing her drink and standing up. "Let's dance," she said, taking his hand as an upbeat song started to play.

"You should know I don't dance," said Chris.

"Well in that case you should know that I don't care," said Rachel, dragging him onto the dancefloor against his will.

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A/N: OK I am going on holidays for two weeks on Sunday so unfortunately will be unable to update, but my trusty notebook is coming with me so I'll have lots of chapter plans and dialouge done for when I get back. If you feel you need a bit more you could try checking out my latest little Charmed dabble Heart to Heart (hint hint.) When I get back I'll have probably decided whether or not to leave it as a one shot or develop it into a the sisters finding out about Chris story.

As ever thanks for those reviews, even though not much seems to happen in this story, ever, but please keep them coming. In about two chapters things will suddenly kick off I promise.

A big thanks to **Sparkling Cherries, Little Miss Spell of the Week, ilovedrew88, Paige Halliwell-Matthews, hazza123, AngelBlack, rcaqua and Charmed Clover **for their reviews. I love you all!

**Kia-Kawaii Princess**: Lol, your system sounds the same as ours. I agree, MUCH simpler. Thanks for reviewing!

**Bec7012**: Oh no, now I'm going to irritate myself until I write some Wyatt-Chris banter without Wyatt . . . I can't resist a challenge. I'm glad my story makes you dance-happy, I enjoyed your review.

**Icantthinkofafnick**: I'm glad someone liked the Claire jokes. One of my best friends is called Clare and she has said all of those things that were in the last chapter but she does it in this really dry, sarcastic way that makes me giggle no end. If she finds out I made them perky she'll kill me! Thanks for reviewing, it was great.

**crimsonshadoe**: Thanks for the review, I hope I give your poor shipping heart something! lol Maybe you are reading too much into it, maybe you're not. I'm taking who ends up together to my grave! Well actually prob not, you'll find out eventually but you know what I mean.

**flephanie:** I can't believe you did A-Level Physics. (shakes head) and I always had such a high opinion of you! lol Ooh you much be clairvoyant, Katie was attempting some matchmaking in this chapter. Thanks for reviewing!


	8. November

**In Love Actually**

**Chapter 8: November**

**AN: Am apologising now for all the mistakes in this cuz it is a last minute post cuz I know I'm not going to get the chance to post it for the rest of the weekend. So this hasn't even been proofed read once. Will prob go though it and fix it all at some point but who knows? Try to enjoy!**

"Clear your mind...imagine yourself surrounded by clouds...floating clouds..."

Patricia slowly opened one eye to have a peek around her. The part-whitelighters had all gathered in the basement where Leo was helping them get into the right mind-set for hovering. So far none of them had been successful and she noticed a few of the others were also peeking. Leo however, was oblivious to this and remained standing in front of them all, eyes closed, head slightly tilted upwards, a perfect model for what the rest of them were supposed to be doing.

"Feel light, feel floaty, surrounded by bubbles . . .blue bubbles...shiny, blue, floaty, bubbles..."

Opening her eyes fully, Patricia fought back a snort of laughter and looking around her, she could tell that everyone else were doing the same. Even Chris who usually took any magical based lesson with a deadly seriousness was silently shaking with laughter.

"Now be light! Be blue! Be free! BE THE BUBBLES!" exclaimed Leo with conviction. He opened his eyes in surprise as a loud chours of laughter echoed through the basement. He let out a sigh realising that none of them were hovering, on the contrary some had even taken to the floor with laughter. "Well if you don't take this seriously you're never going to learn to hover!" he snapped.

"Would that really be a bad thing?" asked Patricia.

"Of course it would be! Hovering is very useful," insisted Leo.

"To who?" asked Wyatt. "It's like levitating but shit cause it's too slow to do anything with."

"He does have a point Leo," said Paige, looking at Leo kindly, not wanting to offend her brother-in-law by flat out telling him how ridiculous the past ten minutes had been. "Learning our whitelighter skills is all well and good but hovering isn't exactly a huge priority. I mean sure if there comes a time when we can't find a ladder and Piper insists we clean the ceiling after another unfortunate incident with a blender that I still say was Phoebe's fault, sure, but until then . . ."

"How can you say that?" asked a frustrated Leo, who was by now determined to defend what he saw as the sanctity of hovering at all costs. "I mean suppose you're cornered by a demon and he throws an energy ball at you, you have to think fast, what do you do?"

"Telekinetically re-direct it," said Chris. "Easier done than said."

"Orb out," said Petulia.

"Freeze it," Patricia suggested.

"I could always shield myself," voiced Wyatt, keen to come up with one that hadn't already been said.

"Call for it," was Paige's solution.

"Ooh we could duck," said Patricia.

"OR . . ." said Leo. "You could hover to avoid it."

"Does this energy ball travel at a snail's pace?" asked Wyatt.

"Wyatt's right, it would hit us before we'd managed to get an inch of the ground. It's not levitating, it's too slow to be used in an attack," said Chris.

"Fine," said Leo. "But what about for stealth? You know sneaking up on people, hiding in high places."

Patricia sighed, "I _suppose_ it _could_ be useful in those circumstances." Leo straightened up as the others mumbled their resignment. "Great, let's give this another go then shall we?" he asked brightly. "And I promise it will be worth it. Now relax . . .imagine yourself floating...like a bubble...a shiny blue bubble..."

The others fought to hold back their laughter, knowing what was coming but Chris beat Leo to the punch, "BE THE BUBBLE!" he exuberantly exclaimed before his father got the chance to, causing another fierce roar of laughter to sound in the room.

"Isn't there anyway to do this without becoming a bubble?" laughed Wyatt, provoking a fresh fit of giggles.

"Yeah," said Patricia. "I keep imagine myself as this blue chewing gum bubble someone is blowing out of their mouth!"

"Oh thanks," said Paige, still half laughing. "Now that's all I'm going to think of too."

"Oh I give up!" said Leo, defeated. "How about we work on something else for now, like glamouring. You all know the uses of it."

"Well my glamouring is pretty perfect so I'm going to go make a few phone calls that are on my to-do list," said Paige, going up the stairs into the kitchen.

"Mine too!" said Wyatt. "And Chris' doesn't need much work either so we should probably just go as well, leave you to work with the ones who need the help."

"Hey!" protested Patricia and Petulia, slightly offened by the comment.

"Actually I haven't glamoured in ages and am probably pretty rusty," Chris reluctantly admitted. "I think I'm just going to stay."

"Maybe you should too Wyatt," Leo advised. "I mean when was the last time you glamoured?"

"Admittedly a while but that doesn't matter!" insisted Wyatt. "Look, I'll prove it," he said, snapping his fingers and turning into Leo. He snapped them again and transformed into Paige. He clicked his fingers many times, each time being engulfed in soft white lights only to reappear as someone new, eventually appearing as Chris.

"Oh no!" screamed Patricia hysterically, frantically looking back and forth between her two identical looking brothers. "There're two Chris'! It's a sign of the apocolypse! It's every man, woman, and part-whitelighter for themselves!" She made a dramatic dive to the ground before doing a few basic tumbles, getting up to applause from her cousin and Chris.

"Having experienced two attempts at an apocolypse I can assure you that it isn't," said Leo.

Wyatt snapped his fingers a last time, regaining his own appearance. "The point is my glamouring is fine. And now, for my spectacular finale, a display of the ultimate whitelighter power . . . orbing!" With that he orbed out.

"The boy has style," said Petulia.

"Yeah but he's usually not that irritable," observed Patricia.

"Maybe something's up?" suggested Leo.

"If so he'll tell me eventually," said Chris.

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"OK so let's re-cap," said Chris. Most of the Council Investigators, or the 'Blue Team,' as Chris insisted they were called, (he'd sent Polly to go change when she had arrived in a yellow t-shirt, saying if she didn't she had better go help the book protectors as that was the colour he had assigned them and as he saw it wearing a yellow t-shirt was disloyal to the team. . . he'd actually gotten pretty mad about it)had gathered in the attic to try and draw some things that they had found out together. They had assembled a large drawing board in the middle of the room where they wrote everything down and were trying to make some sense out of it. "The demonic High Council consists of five demons."

"Four at the moment because there is currently an opening," said Jason.

"Right," said Polly. "And we think they were established about fifteen years ago after the whole near wipeout mess with the Avatars."

"They seem to be a democratic form of the Source," said Paige. "The amount of respect demons have for them indicates that."

Chris nodded in agreement, "They seem to generally run everything down there, keeping demons in check and whatnot."

"Do we have any idea of who is actually on the Council?" Jason asked.

"We've started a list of candidates," said Chris. "You know respected, powerful demons but without more information I can't seem to find anyway of narrowing it down."

"Plus there are all the demons that aren't in the Book," said Polly.

"That's exactly the problem," said Chris.

"Well that about Dermairon?" asked Paige. "I mean are we sure we really vanquished him? It's kinda hard to tell whether or not you can ever fully vanquish someone who exsists out of time."

"I suppose we can't be certain but that spell was pretty specific."

The room momentarily glowed as Leo orbed in, looking slightly more flustered than usual. "I think I found something out." He looked around at the expectant faces.

"Do you want a written invitation to share your information?" asked Chris.

"I just thought I should wait 'til Wyatt get's here."

"He has class and couldn't make it so spill already," said Paige.

"Well I found out that they sort of have an evil Elder quality to them."

Chris shifted uncomfortably in his seat and frowned. He didn't have the best history with evil Elders. "What they go about telling demons that their powers come from their emotions?" he asked, causing the rest of them to smile in an attempt not to laugh.

"They watch over future demons," said Leo, ignoring the remark.

"Future demons? Is that even possible?" asked Polly.

"Yes, well sorta," said Leo, struggling to explain himself. "Have any of you ever heard of Aptimagi?" He sighed haven taken in the blank stares. "They are mortals who are not born with any sort of magical powers but still have the aptitude to learn magic."

"Ah, 'Apti-magi' . . .clever," said Jason.

"If exposed to magic," Leo continued. "They can study it and learn to develop full active powers. Then once they learn their first active power there is a forty eight hour window, a . . ."

"Window of opportunity," interrupted Paige. "I remember this, it was the cause of most of the drama when I first got my powers."

"What is it?" asked Polly.

"There are 48 hours where a nascent witch who hasn't chosen to use their powers for good or evil yet can be swayed either way," explained Paige, rattling off her textbok learnt definition that had been crammed into her brain in the early days when Piper was her slave driving wicca teacher. "Supposedly helps protect free will but it's a load of hooey if you ask me."

"Well thank God no one did ask you or we could have bigger problems on our hands.," said Leo. "Anyway like Elders watch over future charges or whitelighters, the High Council watches over Aptimagi, getting close to them, luring them to evil, then when the time is right, when they are most vulnerable, they expose them to magic, help them learn a power and guide them in a way they are most likely to choose evil."

"So why don't the Elders do this with Aptimiagi too?" asked Chris. "You know, even up the score a bit."

"It's not that simple," said Leo. "Aptimagi are very rare and extremey difficult to track down. We haven't determined a reliable method yet, there are probably thousands of Aptimagi out there who go through life unaware of their gift because they are never exposed to magic so they never learn their craft."

"Are we sure Barbas is in cahoots?" asked Chris. "After all he would be the perfect candidate for turning nascent witches to become warlocks instead, preying on their fears and whatnot."

"Yes, I'm sure," said Paige. "We haven't seen or heard of him in about seven years or so. Pretty sure he's back to his every thirteen hundred years dealio, which means he's no longer our problem."

"Can't you guys just do more re-con in the Underworld?" asked Jason.

"It's difficult at the moment," said Leo. "Demons are unnervingly loyal to these guys."

"Is it possible that even _they_ don't know the identites of who is on the Council?" asked Polly.

"Yes, unfortunately that is a possibility," said Paige, running her fingers through her hair.

"Super," said Chris with mock enthusiasm. "But they must have even some theories on it. They'd have a better idea of who the big cheeses are down there."

"I suppose," said Paige thinking it over.

"Though say a demon manages to get the book," said Chris. "How would they know who to give it to?"

"Maybe they don't so much give it to a person as they do bring it to a place," suggested Paige. "And there is that rumour that they meet once a month on the surface."

"Yeah but they're not going to wait for a month to hand it over," said Chris. "I mean that gives other demons too much opportunity to steal it from them. There must be a pre-arranged place where they would go to hand it over."

"I'm on it," said Leo, orbing out.

"Nice brainstorming," commented Jason.

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Wyatt had orbed home to raid the fridge and pick up some fresh laundry. He was munching on some leftover meatloaf while Paige filled him in on the recent developments in their investigation of the High Council when the doorbell rang. "I'll get it," he offered, getting up and heading for the Manor front door. He swung it open and was greeted with a cheery smile. "Hi!" said the voice that belonged to the smile. Looking up he noticed that the smile and voice belonged to a pretty blonde girl with sparkling blue eyes and a eye-catching pink outfit.

"Uh hello," he said uncertainly.

"Oh you must be Wyatt!" she said in her sing song voice. "Oh what am I saying, of course you're Wyatt Halliwell, I mean hello! Went to Lincon High two of the years you were there, hell I still go there! How's college life treating you? I've been thinking of applying to USC . . ."

"I'm sorry, I don't mean to be rude but, who the hell are you?" asked Wyatt.

For a second the girl looked taken back but it quickly deteriorated with a giggle and fresh smile. "Sorry! In all the excitement I forgot to introduce myself, I'm Claire!"

Wyatt's face flickered with recognition before breaking into a grin. "Oh Claire, hey, come in," he said, stepping back to allow her into the hall. "Chris has told me all about you, you have_ no _idea how good it is to finally meet you!" he told the girl who in a twisted way he thought of as his idol. "Chris is upstairs," he said. "CHRIS! YOU'VE GOT COMPANY!" he bellowed upstairs to his younger brother. "So you here for a night time tutoring session?"

"No silly!" said Claire, "We're going out."

"Oh sorry, yeah," said Wyatt. "It's much too distracting for Chris in here, too many shiny objects. Physics at the park or wherever you guys are going is a much better plan."

Clare giggled again, "No Physics tonight," she said. "Though fingers crossed there'll be some chemistry if you know what I mean."

Confused, Wyatt clearly didn't. "Huh? I thought Chris was good at Chemistry."

"As far as I know he is," said Claire.

"I'm sorry, huh?"

"We're going out on a date, silly!" laughed Claire.

"Huh?"

"Claire sorry to keep you waiting!" Upon hearing his brother's voice, Wyatt turned around and with a confused expression on his face, watched him come down the stairs, his usual two at a time.

"There's my favourite student now!" said Claire, happily. As she walked towards Chris, Wyatt flicked his wrists and froze her.

"What'd you do that for?" asked Chris.

"YOU'RE DATING CLAIRE?" Wyatt demanded to know, still unable to grasp the concept at hand.

"So?

"I thought you hated her!"

"And . . .?" asked Chris, causing Wyatt to stomp his foot in frustration.

"So why are you dating her? I mean was she the only girl left in school that you haven't dated or something so you figured you might as well be a little more well rounded?" asked Wyatt.

"Oh don't be so ridiculous!" said Chris, rolling his eyes. "It's only November, I haven't got through all the freshmen yet. Now, would you mind unfreezing my date?"

"Yes actually, I would, until I find out how she managed to become your date, that is."

"If you must know she wouldn't stop talking about Physics," said Chris. "She kept rambling on about how red-shift is proof of the expansion of the universe no matter how many subject changes I tried so as a last resort I thought I'd see where flirting with her would get me and lo and behold she shut up."

"Did you just say 'lo and behold'?" asked Wyatt. Shaking his head he moved on, "So let me get this straight, you're dating her to stop her from making you learn?"

"Exactly," said Chris. "A little footsie under the tutoring table throws her right off course."

"Just for the record you are reaching new lows," said Wyatt. "So tell me, what happens when you can't take her anymore and break up with her?"

"She'll switch with another one of the tutors and I get a new Physics tutor to work my magic on and start the whole process over again," said Chris. "Besides I can always play the field to help me avoid getting too bored, which will also help insure a more vicious break up, all aiding me in getting a new, easier to distract Physics tutor."

"At this moment I either admire you or am disgusted by you but I can't quite decide," said Wyatt. "One more question, what if your new tutor is a guy?"

"No one is immune to my charm," Chris informed him with a grin. "But we'll cross that bridge when we come to it, so for now can you reanimate my date please?"

"Sure, ready?"

Chris nodded and Wyatt unfroze her and she bounded over to Chris and gave him a quick peck on the cheek. "Sorry I was running a little late," he apologised.

"Oh don't worry about it!" she assured him. "Just don't be so Claire-less about watching the time in future. After all, a good boyfriend is a punctual boyfriend!"

Wyatt choked back his laughter at the expression of horror on Chris' face as he looked over Claire's shoulder, mouthing the word 'boyfriend?' to Wyatt with sheer fear in his eyes. He coughed and gave a nervous laugh, "OK then, well we better get going."

"See you two crazy kids later!" said Wyatt, provoking his brother to give him a stony glare.

"It was great to meet you!" Claire told Wyatt.

"You too!" Wyatt agreed. "Be sure to drive Claire-fully!" Wyatt grinned with satisfaction as Chris glared at him again and Claire gave a small squeal of delight. "Ooh!" she gurgled, clapping her hands together excitedly. "I like you! Don't worry we will, be sure to have a Claire-iffic evening as I'm sure we will."

"Oh I don't doubt it," said Wyatt, as he waved them off.

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A few days later, the entire family had gathered to exchange information on what they had found out and what steps had been taken to make the Book of Shadows better protected.

"So now," finished Piper, "If you are going to the book you must say the word "Ouvrez" before approcahing it cause otherwise you will walk into the invisible forcefield surrounding it, setting off the alarm and enabling the anti-transportation charm on the attic, which means no-one can get out."

"Wow, impressive," said Paige. "'Ouvrez' . . .isn't that French?"

"Yeah," said Phoebe, "It means open. We figured just saying 'open' sounded a little wierd and none of us knew any Latin so French seemed like a good idea."

"Where on earth did you find a spell that does all that?" asked Chris.

"It's a mixture of a Shutdown charm and a Create a Seceret Door spell," said Phoebe. "Found them in books at Magic School."

A cellphone began to ring and everyone looked around as Wyatt began to fumble in his pocket. "Oh sorry, quiet everyone, it's Katie," he said, having looked at the caller ID. He walked into the next room before answering it. "Hello?. . .Hey, how's it going . . .I didn't answer cause I'm not in my dorm, I'm at a friends getting a bit of studying done . . . Yeah they had a book I wanted to borrow . . . They'd read the book, I could ask them questions about what I needed to know for my paper! . . . Yes I'm telling you the truth, why would I be lying to you about this!"

Being able to hear Wyatt's side of the conversation, his family looked around at each other nervously. It was unusual to hear this sort of fight between Wyatt and Katie. They fought frequently but not like this . . .this seemed to be a suspicious fight. Chris in particular was worried, he frowned upon hearing more yells from the next room. His family didn't know but he'd presonally overheard increasingly more fights like this one from either Wyatt or Katie's end lately. The long distance aspect of their relationship seemed to really be taking its toll and to Chris' great surprise he didn't like it.

Ever since Halloween, Chris had realised that he didn't want them to break up for more than their usual few days because no matter what the circumstances surrounding the split were, he'd have to see both his best friend and his brother in copious amounts of emotional pain and hurt. No matter how he looked at it, he definitely cared for Katie and so to see her like that would crush him, not to mention Wyatt's reaction.

His encounter with Rachel had definitely left him better off; he had a tendency to agree with her about the Typical Guy Syndrome, in part, it probably had a great deal to do with the major crush on Katie he had developed for so many months. Thankfully he was beginning to get over it day by day and apart from the occassional daydream he was more than happy to be just best friends with her.

Another thing Rachel had been right about was getting back into his normal dating patterns as Claire had definitely a great deal to do with his fading infatuation with Katie. At first he thought every moment spent with her was going to be flesh-burning agony, with her perky and preppy disposition being too much for him to handle and the whole trying to make him learn his most hated subject thing, but he had been pleasantly surprised when her more irritating qualities became more endearing to him than anything else. The rare times she chilled out a bit he positively loved being in her company. Besides, he figured it was good every now and again to have a girl that drove you beserk.

The tutoring sessions weren't that bad either - he always managed to charm his way into getting five to ten breaks and in between he actually managed to learn the odd thing that kept him in passing grades in class.

He'd never felt so luck to be in possession of his "uncanny ability to charm even the most studious and pragmatic girls into skipping class and breaking a few rules," as Benji had so articulately put it one day. It definitely came in handy when Tom bet him twenty dollars that Claire was out of reach even for him. Chris' challenge had been to talk Claire into skipping a class, preferably Physics to meet him under the bleachers. Twenty dollars richer, Chris had celebrated that night by taking Claire out to her favourite restaurant. Although it had cost him an arm, a leg, his twenty dollar earnings and much more, Chris had actually managed to have a really great time.

"Look I have to go, I'll call you later," said Wyatt miserably before snapping his cellphone shut and ending the call. Chris snapped out of his thought as a glum looking Wyatt took his seat again.

"Everything all right?" asked Piper, genuinely concerned.

Wyatt just nodded dumbly, giving a weak hand gesture, motioning them to continue. Looking at him, Chris made a resolution to try and get Wyatt to talk to him about what was going on so he could dish out some of his now legendary Katie insight, but it would have to wait. They were back to discussing demons and book protecting but Chris had a feeling they were beginning to get things under control.

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"We have came up with a new plan, a better plan as how to make our attempt on the Charmed Ones' Book of Shadows," said a demon in the Underworld. There was a group of various demoons and warlocks gathered there, who had teamed up to pull their individual strengths together in hope of snagging the book. Although they had not yet tried to snatch it, they had devised several different plans but in the end, had deemed each one as unsatisfactory. "Having done some research on the matter, we discovered that everyone who has came close to defeating them had studied them closely, got to know them beyond their identity as Charmed Ones, they learned to think of them as humans . . .people . . .sisiters."

"That's not a plan it's an observation," sneered one warlock.

The demon who had been speaking threw a fireball at him and before he had time to blink out he was vanquished by it, "I hate interruptions," the demon who appeared to have taken to a leadership role revealed. "Some of us have came to the conclusion that the way to get the book is to take our time and spy on them, get to know their mortal lives."

"That will be easier said than done," one demon spoke up. "As demons we're souless, it's very difficult to blend in and mascqurade as humans for an extended period of time. To do so around the Charmed Ones is suicide, they are to familiar with the signs."

"Everything to do with the Charmed Ones is suicide," another demon reminded him.

"Yes, it is a problem," the leader agreed. "And I'm very open to suggestions of how to get around it."

"What about hiring a Phoenix?" a warlock suggested.

"The witch assasins? Don't they work both sides?" one called out.

"Yes," said warlock, who had put the idea forward. ""But as long as they get what they want satisfaction is one hundred percent guaranteed."

"This could work," the leading demon mused. "Find me a Phoenix," he requested and the warlock obediently blinked out.

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**A/N**: So sorry it took me so long to get this posted but once I got back everything else piled up at once; there were exam results, celebrating exam results, getting my new uniform, stationary shopping, going back to school, adjusting to life as a sixth year (mmm...double English Lit more or less everyday!) and piles of homework which I didn't expect for another few weeks. To sum up, I've been busy and I'm sorry.

On the brightside I got quite a bit done when I was away and as of the next chapter I am officially excited about this story again. New rule though: I am not answering ANY questions on the Phoenix storyline (it's as seceret as the who ends up with who thing) cause as you will see over the next two or three chapters it's going to be a bit of a on going mystery to more or less the end of the story. All I'm saying is that there is more than one phoenix out there people, keep that in mind. Now all you have to do is figure out whether I'm just trying to throw you off the scent or if I'm messing with your head.

Sorry again for lack of anything really in this chapter but from chapter 9 onwards we get to the point in the story that I was so desperate to get to: i.e. the point where there are definite storylines and plot...ah bliss!

**OK PEOPLE, THE THING IS I'M REALLY CRAP AT MAKING UP DEMON NAMES SO COULD YOU ALL PLEASE MAKE UP SOME ANDINCLUDE A FEW IN YOUR REVIEW SO I CAN USE THEM? I'D REALLY APPRECIATE IT. As you can see from the end section, I gave up entirely and just referred to them as 'this demon' and 'that demon.'**

Now to those lovely reviewers of mine: I still love you all loads so please, please, please keep them rolling in!

Big thanks to **hazza123, IcantthinkofaFnick, Paige Halliwell-Matthews, ilovedrew88, Little-Miss-Spell-of-the-Week and CrimsonShadoe**for their reviews. DO IT AGAIN!

**Maggie0**: Thanks for reviewing. Yeah that line popped into my head and made be giggle manically for apparently no reason. As for the Leo/Chris conflict that's not really an issue in this story cuz I stupidly resolved it in the last one. I loved that conflict too so it's a bit of a shame. He wasn't really in it before cuz I kept forgetting to include him...swoopsie!

**ChiaraStorm:** I'm sorry, i have to ask, you knew I'd have to ask...wtf is titwalloping? Lol! Sounds amusing (not to mention fun to say.) Sorry about the Claire stuff in this chapter again but it seemed to go down well with everyone else! Oh and btw I happen to be an only child but I've observed my friends' families enough to be able to draw on inspiration from the too happy together family (Trish's) and the kooky slightly dysfunctional one that has lots of sibling fights. (Claire's) Lol, notice two of my best friends share their names with two of my characters? Lol, by sheer coincidence my other two bestest buds are Kate or "Katie" if you will (tho we never call her that, we call her Percie as a nickname instead) and Chris. Jst felft like sharing. Sorry. Thanks for reviewing!

**SparklingCherries:** Thanks, my humour tends to wavour between that really dry, sarcastic wit to pure juvenille 12 year old boy humour where I laugh at dirty words or because I notice the word 'tit' in 'institution.' (Rolls eyes at own immaturity...before tee-heeing at the word 'tit.')


	9. New Year's

**In Love, Actually**

**Chapter 9: New Year's**

**A/N:** Will apologise properly for the delay at the end but to sum up; I'm lazy and this is a very important chapter in the scheme of things. A lot of stuff happens here in the demon plot and the relationship plot. It is pretty much a Chris centric chapter but warning to **_all_** shippers: Sorry! Please don't hate me!

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A demon shimmered back into the cave with a blonde woman beside him. "As you asked for, a phoenix, one with a pretty good reputation I might add."

"You require my services?" the phoenix asked.

"We want you to spy on the Charmed Ones."

"You guys really like to think big, don't you?" smiled the phoenix. "What for?"

"To assess their mortal weaknesses and help determine the opportune moment to steal their Book of Shadows," a demon informed her.

The woman rolled her eyes, "Should have known. That's the problem with demons. You want all the glory without any of the work. I do all your dirty work for you and you get the place on the High Council."

"You think you are up for it?" sneered a demon.

"Would I be here if I wasn't?" she retorted. "I can see how you want a phoenix. We have souls so it will be harder for them to get suspicious about the possibility of me being out to destroy them, I can glamour and so get close to each of them in the guise of different characters, plus I can guarantee that they don't trace anything back to you."

"I think we can come to some sort of agreement," said the main demon, nodding his approval.

"Not just yet," said the phoenix. "If you want me to go up against the most powerful witches in the world I'm going to need some assurances."

"Like what?"

"Like a deposit of three level two powers," she said.

"Three?"

"Don't worry, you get two of them back once the job is done any you get me what I really want."

"And what would that be?"

"Pyrokinesis."

"But that's a power only found in the highest order of demons!" on protested. "It's rare to find, impossible even!"

"So is infiltrating the Charmed Ones," said the Phoenix. "And I am putting my neck on the line here. Oh and once you get the book and a place on the council I want to be kept informed of any goings on that might be of interest to me."

"How dare you.." said one demon.

"Hey, you wanted me," she interrupted, "And trust me here, for what you are asking me to do this is a more than fair deal. A lot of other phoenixes would either flat out refuse or take you for all the high order powers you could name. So do we have a deal or have you wasted my valuable time for nothing?"

"We have a deal," said the leader, holding out his hand.

The phoenix shook it, "It's going to be a pleasure working for you."

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"So, here's the thing you need to know about me buddy, if there aren't fifty long stemmed yellow roses in that church by midday on the 29th of June, I'm going to hunt you down and shove my beautiful white satin three inch stilleto wedding shoes up your God forsaken little ass! You hear me! Do you! Good!" Paige slammed the phone down with a certain amount of self-satisfaction and a considerable dollop of frustration.

"Good day?" Piper asked, smiling.

"Very funny," said Paige, putting one hand on her hip and running the other through her soft red locks. "Why is it that men are incapable of listening? How is it when you say 'fifty', they hear ten...when you say 'yellow', they hear pink and when you say 'to be delivered', they hear to be picked up and then complain when you call to confirm and they tell you that you booked your ten pink roses to be ready to be picked up the day _after_ the wedding?"

"Breathe," Piper instructed, glad for once to be at this end of the orders to maintain steady breathing

Reluctantly following her elder sister's instructions, Paige began to calm down a bit and pulled round a seat and sat down. "I just am up to my eyeballs in wedding stuff and I so desperately want to have a wedding without crazy astral forms running wild, or to find out my husbands actually the source, or to wake up and be invisible or to have the headless horsemen storm the wedding," she said, remembering some of the events at her sisters' weddings.

"Good luck sister!" said Piper.

"The only thing I've managed to get sorted out, was getting Grams to agree to letting me change my last name."

"How'd you wrangle that one?" asked Piper.

"Well, it wasn't so bad because my last name is Matthews and not Halliwell but she said that if I was dead set on changing it, why shouldn't I change it to Halliwell!" said Paige.

"That's ridiculous!" said Piper.

"I know, that's what I said, " Paige told her. "I said it was stupid enough that Petulia's last name was Halliwell, not to mention more trouble than it was worth so I at least was going to take my husbands name. I told her that if she argued anymore about it, I would change Petulia's last name to Parker as well! That shut her up."

"Go Paige!" exclaimed Piper.

"Well I was just off the phone to the dressmaking place so I was really not in the mood to be messed about anymore for one day."

Suddenly a siren could be heard; the two sisters looked at each other before jumping into action. It was the alarm crystals telling them that someone had tried to get to the book without using the password. Piper and Paige rushed to the attic to find the Brunghad and Filarka demons in the attic, all attempting to shimmer out. "Seems like that shutdown spell works," said Piper, flicking her wrists and blowing up a Brunghad. As she turned to blow up another a Filarka ran at her with an axe. Holding out her arms Paige called for it and swiftly vanquished him with his own weapon. Seeing another lunge for them, she waved at the near by crystals, "Crystals! Circle!" The magical crystals disappeared in orbs and appeared around the confused Filarka who tried to continue running but was shocked by the cage's mystical energy and sent flying backwards across the floor unconscious. Piper quickly froze the remaining Filarka as Paige removed the other set of crystals from the trunk.

"Patricia!" called Piper. Within a matter of moments her daughter orbed into the attic. "What is it?" she asked.

"Another attack, can you go get you Aunt Phoebe from Magic School and bring her here so she can reset the protection spells on the book?" asked Piper.

"Sure!" said Patricia, attempting to orb out.

"What the . . ?"

"Shutdown spell remember?" said Piper, smiling, "No dematerialising from the attic once it's been activated."

"Oh yeah," said Patricia, looking a little sheepish, "At least we know the yellow team are doing their job," she said, having adopted Chris' nickname for the Book Protectors. "Freaking blue team think they're so much better than us just because they are in the Underworld for their work, puh-lease!" she mumbled as she left the attic to orb out to Magic School, her last audible words being "The yellow team kick ass!"

Rolling her eyes, Piper turned back to Paige who had set out the crystals around the second Filarka.

"What?" asked Paige, "You have your plan face on."

"I have an idea," said Piper. "How would you feel about working for the yellow team today Paige?"

"I'd feel good about it, just as long as it stays between us. If Chris ever finds out I'm toast."

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"Where have you been?" asked Kuran, the Filarka leader when two of his Filarkan demons shimmered in. "What happened, did you complete the ritual?"

"No, two of the Charmed Ones interrupted us, they had some sort of spell on the attic. We barely got away as it was," said one of them.

"Damn it!" said Dadeck, the Brunghad ruler. "More dead demons."

"We can always try again though, can't we?" asked the other Filarka. "I mean it is not like there is a deadline or anything . . . is there?"

"No, there's not but still, I can't risk someone else getting the book before us and getting Junaram's place on the High Council," said Dadeck who was now pacing.

"Junaram?" asked the Filarka. "He's the demon one the council that was vanquished?"

"O course he was!" spat Kuran, "What's the matter with you two, you are acting strangely?"

"Oh screw it," said one Filaraka, throwing a potion at him. Kuran exploded in flames and a potion was thrown at Dadeck too before he had a chance to ignite a fireball. White lights surrounded the two Filarka, revealing them to be Paige and Piper. "Well at least we got a little information," said Paige.

"Yeah for the blue team," said Piper.

"Good, I won't have to lie to Chris then," said Paige. "Besides we just eliminated the leaders of a major attack on the book, the yellow team had a good trip to the Underworld as well."

"I guess," said Piper. "Come on let's go home and see if Phoebe has re-set this spell."

"Demons attacking on New Year's Eve, whatever next!"

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"So you're allowed something to drink during the New Year's toast, but that's it. Do you hear me young lady?"

"Yes mom," said Patricia rolling her eyes.

"Good," said Chris. "As long as we are in agreement."

"Whatever," said Patricia. "Oh there's Tom, see you later!" she said, heading off in the direction of her boyfriend. Chris waved in his direction, to which he got a smile and a general nod of recognition before he became busy greeting Patricia. Chris glared and gritted his teeth as Tom leaned down to kiss her but quickly shook it off, remembering his promise to Patricia. Although secretly plotting his best friend's untimely demise twenty four hours a day became tiring at times, like a soldier, Chris pulled through.

They were at Mary's New Year's Eve party which was already packed with a mixture of strange and familiar faces. Chris was 'going stag' tonight as Claire had family obligations to which he had been invited but had politely declined, telling her he had to spend the night with his family too. Disappointed, Claire had understood and Chris was glad of the night off just to chill with his friends at a good party.

"Chris?" asked a surprised female voice, one that he hadn't heard since Halloween.

Chris turned around and raised his eyebrows in surprise as he came face to face with Katie's cousin Rachel. It took him a second to recognise her as her previously long, poker straight blonde hair was now red, curly and shoulder length but looking at the familiar sparkling brown eyes and cheeky grin there was no doubt about it. "Rachel! How the hell are you?"

"I'm doing good, and yourself?" she asked, equally pleased to see him.

"Not too bad, how do you know Mary?" Chris inquired trying to figure out how this divine meeting had come about.

"She's a friend of a friend, what about you?"

"Girlfriend of a best friend. You changed your hair, I almost didn't recognise you," said Chris. "It suits you."

"Thanks," said Rachel. "I get bored with my hair pretty quickly," she admitted.

"My aunt is like that," said Chris. "There's an on-going pool at our house on when the next time she will change it and what the change will entail."

Rachel laughed at this idea, "Your aunt and I should meet up and exchange hairstyles, I'm afraid I'm going to run out."

"Doubt it, you're too clever for that," commented Chris.

"Oh so you like, know me now?" Rachel teased.

"As a matter of a fact, yes."

"Then why don't you tell me all about me," she challenged him.

"You are that smart girl that sits at the back of the class doodling because you are just too damn cool to put your hand up. You skip the occasional class, get the odd detention and have at least ten guys chasing after you at any given moment."

"Go on," said Rachel, smiling.

"Despite your occasional deviant behaviour you get along with your parents, especially your mom I'd guess. You enjoy being a bit of a know it all and imparting your wisdom on to your wide circle of friends, which consists mainly of guys but you have a few very close 'gal pals' who you could bare your soul to. You live for the weekends, enjoying the ultimate combination of friends, alcohol and music. So, how'd I do?" asked Chris, with a confident grin.

"I have a 3.6 GPA, I sit in the second back row in all my classes because the teachers always keep an eye on the very back," explained Rachel. "I put up my hand at least once a class to pretend I'm paying attention, I bare my soul to no-one and I'd say it's closer to twenty guys. Everything else seems about right. I have to admit it, Young Grasshopper, I'm impressed."

"Aaah, my work here is done," said Chris, sitting down smugly.

Rachel laughed. "I mean for someone who seemed so clueless last time we met you seem quite insightful now."

"Don't be fooled by my complete lack of insight when it comes to my own life," said Chris. "Other people however is sort of my niche, especially after a few drinks."

"Hey, me too!" Rachel said. "Another few of these and together we will be solving the world's problems! So tell me, Grasshopper, how goes it with you and my cousin? Is she here? I haven't seen her."

"Oh I think her and Wyatt and coming a little later, they needed a little alone time to work some stuff out. As for me I took your advice and am feeling much less obsessive. I think you were totally right about the T.G.S.."

"Excellent, you have learnt the first thing about me."

"And what would that be?"

"That I am always right," Rachel informed him.

Chris laughed, "In my experience most girls always are."

"Damn straight. Couldn't expect anything less from the superior sex," said Rachel.

Chris nodded and Rachel raised an eyebrow in surprise. "What no macho argument about how men rock?"

"Well for the record, guys do rock but in my house it is just generally accepted that females rule the world. Damn estrogen floating about everywhere," he mumbled in pretend resentment.

"Why, how many women are there in your house?" asked Rachel, curious.

"Six, soon to be seven," Chris counted.

"Are you shitting me?"

"I shit not," said Chris, making her laugh.

"Wow," said Rachel. "No wonder you and your brother are so whipped."

"Excuse me? Wyatt, sure, Katie's got him running after her like a lapdog but I am no-one's lapdog," Chris assured her.

"Whatever you gotta tell yourself," smiled Rachel. "And good for Katie. It's great for a girl's self esteem to have a guy that hot obey her every command."

Chris rolled his eyes. "What?" Rachel asked.

"Just don't tell me that after mocking me for liking your cousin, you're into my brother," pleaded Chris.

"Nah, Wyatt's not my type. He's too blond and preppy for my liking. I'm more into the tall, dark and devilishly handsome brooding bad boys with intense brightly coloured eyes. Somewhat clichéd I know but what's a girl to do?" laughed Rachel, shrugging her shoulders.

"Aah," said Chris, knowingly, "T. T. G. S."

"What's that?"

"Typical Teenage Girl Syndrome, always wanting the guy your mother warned you about," Chris said.

Rachel laughed and lightly swatted him on the arm. "Right again."

"As my aunt likes to say, 'just call me butter because I'm on a roll!'"

Rachel laughed again and Chris joined her. Then they stopped and smiled at each other and Chris got a familiar feeling at the pit of his stomach. . . They continued talking for the next hour, both surprised and at how much they were enjoying themselves on a one to one basis. "So I've got a proposition for you," said Chris. "Ooh Chris, we barely know each other!" Rachel giggled.

"No nothing untoward," laughed Chris.

"Shame," grinned Rachel, shaking her head.

"I want you to be my sidekick," said Chris. Rachel gave him a strange look and Chris rolled his eyes, "Don't look at me as though I am about to ask you to fight crime with me." Suddenly beer came snorting out of Rachel's nose as she spluttered with laughter. "What?" asked Chris, mildly confused.

"I swear to God I was about to ask you if you wanted me to fight crime with you!"

"Don't be ridiculous!" pahed Chris.

"Honestly I was," said Rachel, mopping up her drink from herself with the help of a near by napkin. "I was going to argue that you would be _my _sidekick because my outfits were made for the main bike, not the sidecar."

"Are you kidding me? Girls always ride in the sidecar!"

"Not this girl," said Rachel. "So if being your sidekick doesn't involve fighting crime, what does it entail?"

"Making sure I sober up before I go home tonight," said Chris. "Tom, the sensible drinker of our group used to be my sidekick."

"What happened?"

"He started dating my sister," said Chris.

"Ah," said Rachel, nodding understandingly.

Chris took another deep drink, "My baby sister."

"I see," said Rachel.

Another drink. "My baby sister who he happens to be making out with in that corner over there right now."

"Oh, yeah, she looks really like you, well from what I can tell from this angle. Here," said Rachel handing him another beer as he finished off the one he had. "Trying not to go over there and kill him?"

"Oh yes," said Chris. Chris' cell rang, "Excuse me," he said answering it. "Hello? Claire, hey, how's it going? Yes it is getting pretty loud here. My parents have invited a lot of friends around to the house this year, what can I say? If I thought they wouldn't notice I'd slip out and over to see you in a heartbeat but unfortunately they are keeping close tabs on me. OK, Happy New Year to you too in an hour. OK, bye!" With a sigh a relief Chris hung up.

"Is that your girlfriend?" Rachel asked.

Chris barely hid the look of terror on his face, "No, I couldn't say that she is."

"Aaah," said Rachel. "You're that type that just doesn't do girlfriends."

Chris raised a suggestive eyebrow, "Now I couldn't exactly say that either."

Rolling her eyes, Rachel reached across and slapped him on his arm. "Filthy minded teenage boy!"

"What? I was just saying . . ." protested Chris, rubbing his arm and pouting with mock hurt.

"So what is the story with this chick then...Claire was it?"

"Yeah, Claire's her name. She's just someone who I am casually dating," said Chris. "She's nice and all, if not a bit boring. Just something to keep me entertained really."

"Does she know this?"

"Yeah, of course," said Chris. "I may be a lot of things but I'm not really into messing girls around. She started off calling me her boyfriend but after a week or I pulled her about it and told her that it just wasn't what this was."

"And what'd she say to that?" asked Rachel.

"She said she understood and while it would have been nice she was fine with it. It has only been very recently she has began indicating to me that at this stage she'd like it to be more than just casual dating," said Chris, running his fingers through his hair. "So I'm just going to have to end it."

Rachel hit him again, "Men! You really are jackasses!"

"But aren't I an adorable one?" asked Chris, producing the puppy dog eyes.

"For all your bad points I suppose you are," Rachel finally admitted, "I mean you could have messed her around a lot more I guess. So tell me, if you are over my cousin and the girl you are casually dating isn't here, who do you hope to be kissing at midnight?" asked Rachel. "Let me guess, if you follow your normal pattern that would make her typically unattainable, right?"

Chris laughed, "Perhaps, I mean according to your theory is it even possible for me to be into a girl that isn't out of my league?"

"Nope," said Rachel. "But you never know. What's she like, do I know her?"

"Maybe. I mean I haven't spent that much time with her yet but she seems pretty great. She has red curly hair, a great sense of humour and these amazing chocolate brown eyes," said Chris.

"Oh I don't know, she seems pretty unattainable to me," said Rachel, blushing slightly.

"Well I guess I'll just have to sit back and hope she's into the 'dark haired brooding bad boys with intense green eyes'," sighed Chris, smiling. Rachel gave an awkward smile as Chris grinned at her. "But until then I guess I'm stuck talking to you," he said, breaking the silence and taking another drink.

"How awful for you," she joked.

"Tell me about it," said Chris.

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"Maybe you should just go on to the party without me," said Katie.

"I don't want to," said Wyatt. "Who would I kiss at midnight?"

"Whoever the hell you want," said Katie.

"Oh come on, you don't mean that."

"Don't I?" Katie sighed. "I think maybe we just need to take a little break. This long distance thing is just really getting to me at the moment."

"Katie . . ."

"No, hear me out," Katie pleaded. "I love you Wyatt but maybe we are just in over our heads. We are too young to be tied down and being apart isn't exactly helping. I'm not saying we break up, but I do think we should stop dating just for a while, maybe a few weeks or so to let us both get a chance to sort ourselves out and figure out what it is we want out of this."

"But I already know what I want," protested Wyatt. "You." He moved towards her and wrapped his arms around her.

Sighing, Katie reluctantly rested her head on his chest, "I wish it was that simple."

"It is," he insisted. "It can be."

"Not it's not. We can't go on like we are now, the bitter fights, the jealousy, the suspicion and even worse it is all happening over the phone!" argued, Katie, pulling out of his embrace, tears in her eyes. "If we don't stop to take a breather we are going to end up hurting each other worse than we have before. Honestly the last thing I want to do is end this for good, in fact I damn well refuse to give up on us completely but if we don't take this break I see no other option."

Wyatt sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. Looking up he saw that Katie was silently crying, a single tear rolled down her cheek as she looked at him with a soft, sad look in her eyes. Wyatt walked over to her and hugged her again. After a few seconds he pulled away, "I'll go back to college in a few days. I'll ring you when I'm leaving just to say goodbye. Then it is up to you. Call me whenever you feel you are ready and I'll drop everything and drive back here and we'll talk things out. OK?" Katie nodded and Wyatt kissed her tenderly on the forehead. "I love you, don't forget that," he whispered, before he gave her hand a little squeeze, turned around and left.

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"Why do you look so edgy?" Patricia asked.

"Chris keeps looking over and glaring at me," said Tom.

"Oh he's probably just planning your untimely demise," said Patricia. "I mean you do have your arm around me, it is probably punishable by death in the Land of Chris." Tom quickly uncoiled his arm from around Patricia's waist and shoved his hand in his jeans pocket. "Hey!" complained Patricia, "I didn't say to do anything about it! Besides Chris seems otherwise preoccupied."

"Yes he does," acknowledged Tom, putting his arm back around Patricia. "Who's the redhead?"

"No idea," said Patricia. "Slut of the week?"

"Come on now," protested Tom, "That's not fair, on either your brother or the sluts."

"I guess," said Patricia, smiling.

"Hey is that Wyatt?" asked Tom. Patricia looked in the direction Tom had been looking and saw her eldest brother walking towards them. "Yeah," she said distractedly.

"He's looking pretty rough."

"Nicely understated," said Patricia, now deeply frowning as she watched Wyatt snatch a bottle of beer from someone's hand as he walked towards her. "Excuse me," she said walking out of Tom's embrace and over to Wyatt.

"Patricia! Look everyone it's Patricia!" yelled Wyatt, throwing his arms around her, causing them both to tumble backwards.

"Good to see you too," said Patricia, her concerned tone contrasting with her words. "Wyatt what's the matter?"

"I don't know what you mean, I feel great!" said Wyatt, a watery smile on his mouth. He stepped towards her and bent down to whisper in her ear, "I stopped on the way over here, and had beer," he said it a secretive tone. "This many!" he told her, holding up six fingers.

"Wyatt, this isn't like you," said Patricia, worried.

"What you mean? It's a party, people drink at a party you know."

"Yes, people do, even you do but not in copious amounts," said Patricia. "Wyatt what happened?"

His smile faded and a scowl dominated his face, "Katie and I broke up," he mumbled quietly. "But it's OK, it's only for a while!" he said, with mock enthusiasm. "Here's to only for a little while!" Wyatt raised his beer in a toast and downed the rest of it in one before going off to find another.

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"30 seconds everybody!"

Chris and Rachel grinned at each other upon hearing this announcement. "So it's almost midnight," said Rachel. "If there was ever a time to make a move on this dream girl of yours it would be pretty damn soon."

"I guess," said Chris.

"And yet here you are standing here with me," Rachel said, a coy smile on her face, "Whatever will Dream Girl think?"

"Oh I think she'll be OK with it," grinned Chris.

"10, 9, 8!" Chris and Rachel joined the countdown as everyone got ready to welcome in 2021. "7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1! Happy New Year!" the room yelled.

"Happy New Year Chris," said Rachel, taking a step closer to him.

"Happy New Year Rach," said Chris, starting to lean in, taking a second to note the irony of him once again kissing a girl during a countdown as Rachel tilted her face upwards slightly. Suddenly Chris felt himself being shoved to the side as a unidentified mass tackled him to the sofa and landed on him. "Hasspy Nuse Year Chrissy!"

Make that _almost_ kissing a girl.

Startled, Chris realised it was in fact Wyatt who was lying on top of him. "Do you two want a room?" asked an amused looking Rachel who was standing over them with one eyebrow raised.

"No but a crowbar could be handy if you have one on you," said Chris, trying to pry Wyatt off him. "Wy would you mind getting off of me?"

"Sure thing lil bro!" said Wyatt, sitting up straight and fervently ruffling Chris' perfectly producted messy hair.

"Wyatt!" yelled Chris, a little angry at being interrupted, "Are you . . .?" Chris trailed off. He had been going to say 'mad' but after taking a few seconds to take in his brother's narcotized smile and slight sway he decided to rephrase. "Are you _drunk_!"

"Oh so what if I am?" asked Wyatt. "You know you don't have the. . . the Scrabble on age-under drinking you know, you know."

"What?" asked Rachel who had failed to interpret the sentence Wyatt's alcohol fueled mind had produced.

"I don't have the monopoly on underage drinking," said Chris. "Man we lived together too long. Wyatt what happened? I mean yeah you drink but I don't think you've ever been drunk before."

"Well isn't getting drunk what do you . . . when . . . when you get your heart brokeny?" asked Wyatt. "I'm tired of you and . . .that other one, what's her name? . . .Trish! You and Trish asking me what's wrong and telling me normally drunk I don't get. I'm going to find a lesser downer people," said Wyatt getting up and leaving.

"Wow he was really drunk," commented Rachel.

"I know," said Chris, running a hand through his hair absent-mindedly. "Did he say something about having his heart brokeny, I mean broken?"

"I think so," said Rachel. "Does that mean him and Katie . . .?"

"I don't know," said Chris. "I'm going to see if I can find Patricia and see what she knows."

"I'll be here," smiled Rachel.

"Great," said Chris, starting to walk off before a hand reached out and grabbed his shoulder, turning him around. Rachel gave him a quick kiss on the lips. "Just in case Dream Girl's watching," she explained. "Thought I'd help you out by making her jealous."

"Good thinking Batwoman," said Chris, struggling to keep his composure. "Though I think I wanna go the whole hog and make her 'insanely pulling out her own hair until she comes and finds me' jealous."

"I'm up for that," agreed Rachel. "We'll work on it when you get back, go find your sister."

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Having talked to Patricia, Chris had his fears confirmed; Katie and Wyatt had broken up. His only consolation was that Patricia had also remembered Wyatt muttering something about it being temporary, "Only not so articulately," Patricia recalled. Chris had of course then went in search of Wyatt but had been unable to find him, even making a quick scan around the perimeter of the house. He had also tried calling Katie but there had been no answer either at her house or her cell phone. Feeling out of options he headed back to the side room where he had left Rachel.

Rachel was talking a pretty brunette. "Hey stranger," joked Rachel, upon spotting Chris. "Did you find her?"

"Yeah, from what I can tell Wyatt and Katie definitely broke up but for a trial basis or something," Chris told her. "Hi, I'm Chris by the way."

"Hey, I'm Lily," said the brunette.

"Well Lily you are going to have to excuse me from anything I say or do because I'm already quite tipsy and after this latest development I plan on getting much drunker," said Chris, taking another drink as if to prove his point.

"Told you," said Rachel to Lily, who only laughed.

"Told her what?" asked Chris, raising an eyebrow and frowning slightly.

Lily and Rachel exchanged knowing smiles as Lily got up. "Good to meet you Chris," she said walking off. "Talk to you later Rach."

"Bye Lily!" Rachel called after her.

"Told her what?"

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A few hours later, Chris was walking Rachel home, after she had threw her arms around him and said, "Take me drunk I'm home!" Using each other for support, they walked along the streets of San Francisco, letting the cool night air sober them up. "You know as your sidekick I shouldn't leave you until you have sobered up more, that's our promishe, isn't it?" said Rachel, happily gazing up at Chris who merely chuckled, "Well it wasn't exactly a blood oath or anything."

"It was a promishe though, and I keep my promishes."

"It's a good quality to have," said Chris, gently slurring, completely content in his alcohol subdued state.

"I'll keep my promishe if it means having to follow you all the way to your bedroom mister," said Rachel, wiggling her eyebrows and poking him determinedly in the chest.

Chris laughed, "I'm the one who's supposed to be walking you home."

"Yeah," nodded Rachel, "Plus you live with like twenty girls. Dream girl must be s_oooooooooooooooooooooo_ jealous."

Laughing again, Chris turned them both into an alley, "This is a longcut to your house. Gives us more time to get our act together."

Rachel giggled, "Oh goodie."

Suddenly three demons shimmered in, blocking their path. The two teenagers stopped dead in their place. "Missed us?" one asked, eying Rachel. "No not really," said Chris, waving his hand and sending him flying backwards through the air and into a dumpster the other end of the alley. Adrenaline having kicked in, Chris was fully alert, free from the effects of his alcohol consumption.

"There is a perfectly reasonable explanation for . . ." Looking around to check on Rachel, Chris trailed off dumbfounded as he saw a demon being vanquished-did Rachel just throw an energy ball? Sensing his distraction, the third demon lunged forward and threw an energy ball of his own. The last thing Chris remembered before he hit the ground was Rachel yelling his name. Then, as he closed his eyes there was silence...

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**A/N2:** Hey everybody, I know it has been simply ages but I have just been so busy recently. Plus this chapter was quite long and pretty packed with lots of different plots going on. I sort of see this chapter as the beginning of the second phase of this story so didn't want to post it until I was happy with it. The next chapter will probably be a while as well, although hopefully not as long of a wait as this was but still, wouldn't hold my breath if I were you guys!

I was completely dumbfounded by the amount of reviews that flooded in over the last month or so. I should leave you guys hanging more often! Please can everyone who reviewed the last chapter review this one as well! I love hearing what you guys think and it guilt trips me into writing!

Thanks to: **Sam, Kia-Kawaii Princess, Icantthinkofafnick, Paige Halliwell-matthews, mjp3, Michelle, ilovedrew88, bec7012, Rose, Aaliyah Hunter, Jade Almasy, supernateral, Buffgirl **and **Faith-charmer **for their reviews! Love you guys!

**Sparkling Cherries**: I love finding people with the same humour dynamic as me! Yay! Yes I just finished my GCSEs and started my ASs. Some Claire coming up in the next chapter...I think. :S

**Crimsonshadoe**: I love that my story has shippers! I mean in one way it is kind of sad because one way or another people are going to end up disappointed with the ending. So you have turned on Claire have you? I am thinking of making her a recurring character for this story...nothing has been decided yet though.

**Flephanie**: Hey you! Was beginning to think you'd moved to Timbuktu but no, just went to uni. How is it? Is it fab? Ah I can't wait to go and sit in an uni English Lit class... Anyway thanks for fitting in reading this. Dont suppose there is any chance of you doing a little updating soon? Didn't think so :(

**CharmedClover**: Ah another shipper! I have yet to find an antidote but will let you know when I do! At least I am successfully keeping people on their toes!

**CharmingPiper:** Having seen the wish list you outlined in you review I assume you enjoyed this chappie?


	10. Due Date

**In Love, Actually**

**A/N:** Sorry! Review replies and more apologies at the end. Also I apologise for lack of spell check. The start has some overlap with the last chapter.

_Chapter 10: Due Date_

"Rachel!"

Rachel turned around to see her friend Lily heading towards her. "Hey Lily, enjoying the party?"

"Yeah, it's kind of awesome," said Lily, sitting down beside her. "So what is the life of most parties doing sitting by herself on the outskirts?"

"Enjoying meaningful and occassionally silly conversation," said Rachel.

Lily raised an eyebrow, suddenly worried about her friend's mental state. "With yourself?"

"Well it is the only way to get an intelligent conversation these days," joked Rachel. "There _was_ a guy here."

"Oooh do tell," said Lily.

"His name's Chris."

Lily frowned, searching back through her mind, "Chris? As in your cousin's boyfriend's hot younger brother?"

"The very same," said Rachel. "Mary is his best friend's girlfriend."

"Wow this is quite the incestusous little circle you are worming your way into," laughed Lily as Rachel rolled her eyes. "So why has he abandoned you?"

"Well Wyatt, my cousin's boyfriend stumbled over here drunk about five minutes ago, mumbling incoherently about a break up," Rachel explained. "Chris was worried so went off to find his sister to see if she knows anything about it."

"So he would rather spend time with his sister talking about his brother than getting to know you more?" asked Lily. "So he's clincally insane."

"He is just very into his family," said Rachel.

"That doesn't sound like your type."

"Well he has his whole 'too cool for school' thing going on as well."

"Sounds like a contradiction of terms."

"That's part of why he is so interesting," said Rachel. "He's this really great mixture of bad boy and angel."

Lily stared at her friend with an amused smile, "Oh you got it bad."

"Shut up!" said Rachel, a little flushed, swatting at Lily's arm.

"Oh come on you, the man eater, are sitting there waiting for some guy, while talking about him with an annoyingly dreamy look on your face," said Lily. "You just used the term 'angel' which says enough in itself. Besides 'the bad boy with a heart of gold' is actually a myth."

"Ye of little faith," said Rachel. "Wait to you see, you'll understand what I mean. In fact here's your chance, he's heading back this way." She and Lily both looked around to see Chris approaching. "Hey stranger, did you find her?"

"Yeah, from what I can tell Wyatt and Katie definitely broke up but for a trial basis or something," said Chris before turning around to face Lily. "Hi, I'm Chris by the way."

"Hey, I'm Lily," she said with a smile.

"Well Lily you are going to have to excuse me from anything I say or do because I'm already quite tipsy and after this latest development I plan on getting much drunker," said Chris, taking another drink as if to prove his point.

Rachel turned around to Lily with a smug look, "Told you."

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Rachel stopped dead in her place as the three demons had shimmered in in front of her and Chris. They were the same breed as the demons she had stolen a ceremonial sword from a few days earlier; they were clearly here for payback. "Missed us?" the one in the middle asked, glaring directly at her. Before she had time to try and come up with a logical explanation for this she heard Chris say "No, not really."

The next thing she knew the demon had went flying through the air, landing in a nearby dumpster . . . had Chris just used telekinesis? Rachel shook off her shock and flew into action; they could talk about this later. She brought her hand foward, creating a high voltage energy ball and sent it zooming through the air towards the demon who had just produced an athame. He exploded in flames just as Chris said, "There is a perfectly reasonable explanation for . . . " Rachel turned around just in time to see Chris being hit in the stomach by an energy ball. "Chris!" she screamed in panic as she watched him hit the ground.

Fueled by anger she spun around to face the demon who had hit him, throwing an energy ball at him. The demon avoided it and then threw an athame at her. Rachel shimmered out and appeared behind the demon. She quickly drew the athame she kept in her boot and stabbed him from behind. She rushed to Chris as the demon exploded. "Chris!" she said firmly, trying to stir him. She knelt down beside him; at least he was still breathing. She pulled up his top to examine the damage. Seeing the searing red wound, she placed a hand on him and shimmered them out.

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As Chris drifted back into the realm of counciousness, he felt a dull pain in his stomach, searching threw his mind he tried to remember what happened. Alleyway. Demons. Rachel. Rachel throwing energy ball. Energy ball hitting him. His eyes slowly fluttered open and he sat up, taking in his surroundings. He was in an unfamiliar bedroom; the walls were cream with a purple border, the bed he was on was large and covered with a plain lavender coloured duvet and in the corner he saw Rachel asleep in a wicker chair. Looking down at his abdomen, he lifted up his top and he peeled back the dressing on his wound to find that it had been treated with a sweet smelling salve and had already healed considerably, the redness already fading. Not that Leo would not heal it as soon as he got home but at least he was not in too much pain for now.

Getting up slowly, Chris headed to where Rachel was situated, wincing when the sunlight that had started to filter through the curtains reached his eyes; that would be his hangover kicking in right on schedule. 'Well she appears to have some sort of miracle healing balm so she should have aspirin,' thought Chris, as he gently shook Rachel awake. He needed some answers and as pretty and as peaceful as she looked as she slept, he needed them now. Stirring, Rachel slowly opened her eyes with a confused look, a small smile appearing on her face when she saw Chris standing over her. "Hey, you are OK?" she asked groggily, stretching out her arms and legs.

"Yeah, thanks," said Chris. "I take it we are back at your place?"

"Yeah," nodded Rachel, standing up and a few moments silence fell between them. "So this is awkward."

"Yes," agreed Chris. "I believe this particular situation would fall into that category."

"So . . . " began Rachel. "You are a witch."

"Look who's talking," said Chris, bouncing the comment back.

"I wasn't accusing you of anything," said Rachel. "I just don't come across many male witches. The gene tends to run through the females in witch families."

"Yeah well Wyatt was kind of a surprise to the family as well," said Chris. "My parents had to give away all the pink baby stuff they had bought."

"And then you added to the mix."

"Well I wasn't so much of a surprise seeing as my future self orbed in and hung out with the family before I was even conceived," said Chris.

"What?" asked Rachel, confused. "Your future self? Wait, did you say orbed?"

"Yeah, I'm half whitelighter," said Chris.

"Holy shit!" said Rachel. "That makes you a Halliwell."

"Ding! Ding!" said Chris, imitating a game show buzzer.

"And the son of a Charmed One," said Rachel, with a dazed look on her face. "Two brothers called Chris and Wyatt, how didn't I put that together? Wow, my cousin is dating twice blessed Wyatt Halliwell."

"Not anymore, remember?" said Chris, remembering the night's events.

"I can't believe this!" said Rachel.

"So what about you?" asked Chris. "What's your background like? What about Katie, does she know about this? Hell does she have powers?"

"No, she doesn't know anything about magic," said Rachel. "I'm related to her on my dad's side and even he didn't know about magic until after he married my mom."

"She didn't tell him?"

"Nope. When she eventually did he couldn't take it that she had been keeping it from him for so long, so they ended up getting divorced," Rachel told him.

"I'm sorry," said Chris.

"Yeah, me too," said Rachel. "He lives in New York now but it is not too bad. I mean I can shimmer over and see him whenever I like."

"Did you say shimmer?" asked Chris, suddenly on his guard.

"Um yeah," said Rachel. "I'm a Phoenix."

"A what?" asked Chris.

Rachel sighed before sitting down on the bed. "A Phoenix, it's a family of elite witches," said Rachel, waving her hand across her left wrist, removing a glamour to reveal her red, flame type birthmark. "We are all born with this birthmark, it symbolises our rise from the Salem ashes."

"Wow, nice lineage," said Chris, closely examining the mark; why did it look so familiar?

"Not really," said Rachel. "It means that vengence is in our blood, we have no alleginces, not even with other witches. We work for whoever is willing to pay us the most."

"Even demons?" asked Chris.

Rachel nodded, "It's our way. I know you probably don't agree with it . . ."

"You're right, I don't," said Chris. "I believe that there is good and evil and that people have to pick a side."

"Well my few hundred years or so of heritage would have to disagree with you there," said Rachel.

"So are you telling me that if a demon paid you enough to kill an innocent, you would?" asked Chris, trying to understand.

"If the price was right, maybe," said Rachel.

"Then that puts you on their side," argued Chris.

"That's not fair!" protested Rachel. "Doing a few jobs for demons does not make me evil."

"Actually, I'd say it kind of does," said Chris. "You just admitted that you would kill an innocent, that definitely doesn't qualify you as good!"

"Would is not always the same as could Chris and people aren't always that innocent," debated Rachel. "It's not only demons that are evil, humanity isn't exactly great either. They have a serious history of persecution as we are only all too aware of."

"So that makes it alright for you to go around assassinating them for demons?" asked Chris. "I mean is doing demon's dirty work sort of like a part time job for you?"

"No, it is a lifestyle," said Rachel. "It is the way I was brought up, what I was born to do. I never have killed any of your precious innocents but if the time calls for it I have been fully trained to do so. Things are not as black and white as you seem to think Chris, I never would have thought you could be so narrow minded. At the moment I am kind of concentrating on having a normal life. I love being a Phoenix, I'm proud of my culture, my heritage, the status that comes with it in all the right circles but I'm not quite ready to embrace all the aspects of that life just yet."

"I can't believe this," said Chris. "I need to sit down." Sitting down beside her on the bed, he ran his fingers threw his hair. "This is just too crazy. I mean I spend the entire night with you, admiring your energy, thinking what a breath of fresh air you are and then I find out that you are from a family of assassin witches!"

"And I find out that you are from a family of prophesised good witches," said Rachel. The two teenagers sat in silence for a few moments, processing the information they had shared with each other. "We kind of have a magical ying, yang thing going on here," Rachel half joked.

"Yeah," said Chris quietly. "I don't agree with your entire perspective on the fundamental aspects of magic. You are trained to kill."

"And you are trained to protect the innocents. When you think about it," said Rachel, "We are practically enemies."

"It would seem that way," Chris agreed. "I fight for good and you. . ."

"Have no qualms about fighting against good," said Rachel. "It's so strange. Good magic is in your blood, you are even part angel!"

"And you seem to be in possession of a few demonic powers."

"True," said Rachel, who couldn't help but laugh.

"Care to share the joke?"

"My mother would kill me if she knew I was sitting here with the son of a Charmed One!" she giggled.

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure my mom would be flipping out about now if I was consorting with the likes of you," said Chris, cracking a smile as well. "She would definitely hate it."

"So I guess that our respective families would not be amused if we did anything more than 'consorting,'" said Rachel, raising a suggestive eyebrow.

"For sure," mumbled Chris, in a low voice.

"You could even say that it would practically be forbidden," Rachel quietly suggested as she inched towards him.

"Oh yeah, I should probably be considering the best way to vanquish you," said Chris, his eyes set on her lips. "You know, either I'm having a really convenient memory lapse or we never did have a proper midnight kiss."

"Happy New Year," said Rachel, her lips coming into contact with his.

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Wyatt groaned as he felt a sharp pain in his leg. 'Wait, shouldn't it be my head that is suffering?' The pain that this thought caused made him realise that as expected his head was suffering as well. 'Did I drink so much that my hangover is being felt by my leg as well?' he wondered as he felt another jab in his leg. His eyes flew open as he was hit in the face with a rush of icy cold water. Jumping out of bed, his eyes wide and his mouth hanging open in shook as he shook his head, trying to shake off some of the excess water as he took in the sight of his sister standing in front of him with a bucket.

"What the hell did you do that for?" he demanded, wincing at the volume of his own voice, suddenly feeling bad for everytime he had laughed at Chris when he was suffering a hangover.

"Well poking you with a pen did not seem to be working," Patricia reasoned.

"So clearly an attempt to drown me was on the cards," Wyatt snapped sarcastically, accepting the towel Patricia offered him and beginning to pat himself dry from what was entering his chart as the worst wake up call ever.

"You were dead to the world! I saw no other way."

"Gently shaking me or calling my name never occured to you?" asked Wyatt bitterly.

"Chris never came home last night," said Patricia.

Wyatt stopped dabbing himself with the towel, she had his attention now. "What?"

"There's no sign of him and I can't sense him," said Patricia, concern written across her features.

"Me neither," said Wyatt, after a moment of trying. "Does mom know yet?"

"No, everyone just assumed that he is sleeping late," said Patricia. "I didn't want to say anything to the contrary in case nothing is wrong and I was just getting him into trouble."

"Good idea," said Wyatt. "Chances are that he is either still partying or passed out on someone's floor."

"Exactly," said Patricia, although neither her or Wyatt's worried expressions reflected their words.

"Though I don't know why neither of us can sense them, that isn't good."

"Nope," agreed Patricia. "If he isn't back in an hour, then we tell them."

"OK," said Wyatt. "Now if you'll excuse me, I have some throwing up to do."

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Chris orbed into the Manor with the goals of avoiding his mother until he had managed to have a shower and so wash away all evidence that he had been out the entire night. He was just about to undress when Patricia came bursting through the door. "Christ!" he exclaimed, "Ever try knocking?"

"Every try coming home or at least checking in?" Patricia retorted.

"Touché," said Chris, after a moment's contemplation.

"So are you OK?"

"Apart from the few years you just took off my life, a minor energy ball wound and a mild hangover I'm fine," said Chris.

"Energy ball wound?" Patricia quizzed.

"Yeah had a little run in with some demons last night," Chris told her, quickly deciding to leave out the specifics of what had happened since he saw his sister last. It was better if no one in his family knew that Rachel was a Phoenix. He wasn't fully sure why, but he felt that it was for the best, he didn't want them worrying about nothing. "Nothing major though, just held me up for a while. So you been speaking to Wyatt about what happened with Katie?" Chris asked, hoping to turn the attention away from his activities.

"Not yet," said Patricia. "But I will. On the upside we can hold last night's behaviour over him the next time he tries to do anything that resembles golating the next time we get into trouble."

"At least there's an updise," Chris agreed, although he was not too cheerful about confronting Wyatt about what had happened. "How about later you take Wyatt and I'll check up on Katie. We get both sides of the story and then start the meddling."

"Excellent idea. You should shower first though cause you look awful," commented Patricia.

"Ah I see it is Compliment Chris Day again," said Chris sarcastically. "For your information I was on my way to the shower when you decided to invade my privacy."

"Well I wouldn't have had to if you had came home or told us where you were," complained Patricia.

"We've been here before," Chris reminded her.

"I recognise that tree," Patricia quipped.

"Out!" requested Chris, pointing in the direction of his door.

"You can't make me," Patricia challenged, folding her arms in a defiant manner. Chris simply shrugged before pulling off his top and discarding it on the floor. "All right!" said Patricia, clamping a hand firmly over her eyes once Chris started to unbutton his jeans. "I'm going."

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"Hello, Mrs Halliwell?"

Piper looked up from her desk to see a blonde woman in a suit standing in front of her. "Yes?" asked Piper.

"Hi, I'm Joanna Philips," said the woman, offering her hand, which Piper took and shook.

"Oh hi, thanks for coming," said Piper, gesturing to the seat facing her. "I rang your angency yesterday I didn't expect you to come so soon."

"Well we are prompt like that," said Joanna sitting down.

"Can I get you anything?" offered Piper. "Water? Tea?"

"No thank you," smiled Joanna. "So why don't you tell me what I can do for you Mrs. Halliwell."

"Please call me Piper," she said, sitting back down. "Well I saw your agency's advertisement in the paper saying that you offered advice to people looking to start their own business and my new year's resolution is to finally open a restaurant but there is so much I'm not sure how to go about."

"Well then you have certainly rang the right place," said Joanna. "This looks like a fine establishment, from what I understand it is pretty popular."

"Yes," said Piper proudly. "It's been doing so well recently that I think I can finally afford to set up a restaurant. I mean by now I am pretty confident in running my own business but I remember how difficult it was to get it started and I feel that getting some professional help this time around wouldn't be such a bad idea."

"You sound like a smart woman, and I'm not just saying that because you are going to pay me," laughed Joanna

"That's good to know," said Piper, feeling better about her decision all ready.

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"Come in," said Katie hoarsely.

Chris opened Katie's bedroom door and entered to find his best friend huddled up on her bed, looking less than on top form.

"Hey," he said quietly, closing the door behind him.

"Hey," Katie whispered, the traces of a smile playing on her lips. "I take it you heard."

"Well heard is a relative term," said Chris. "Wyatt was drunk and said some stuff about you and him and how you were on a break. It sounded very 'Friends.'"

Katie gave a small smile at that, "You and your Friends addiction." She sat up straight on the bed, her back against the headboard as she took a pillow in her arms, hugging it in a form of self comfort. "Wyatt was drunk?"

"Completely wasted," Chris confirmed, sitting down beside her. "So you two are at another 'off again' part of your constant on again off again relationship that leaves the rest of us dizzy?"

Katie nodded, "It's for the best. The long distance thing was not working out and we both need some time away from each other to sort ourselves out."

"That sounds sensible," said Chris, trying to be understanding.

"It's also really hard," she whispered, her eyes welling up with tears.

Chris sighed and draped an arm around her as her head rested on his shoulder. For once he could not think of any ingenious plans to sort this one out.

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"Hey Pheebs, how is it going?" asked Paige as she approached Phoebe at her position slumped over some books at Magic School.

"Not particularly well," she admitted. "I can't seem to find any new ways of keeping the Book of Shadows safe."

"Well our current way is working out nicely for now," said Paige. "But I'd like you to meet Janine." Phoebe turned to the blonde woman beside Paige and smiled. "Nice to meet you."

"Same here," said Janine eagerly. "My first day and I've already met two Charmed Ones!"

Phoebe laughed at her enthusiasm. "Janine is one of our new TAs," Paige explained. "But there is not much to be done at the moment so I suggested that maybe you would need some help, I explained our little home situation."

"Yeah that would be great," said Phoebe.

"Although if working on protection spells gets too boring and you want to do some reseach on the High Council for the blue team, that would be great also," said Paige to Janine. "Well I'd better be going. Call me if you need anything."

Paige headed back to her class and Phoebe turned back to Janine. "Pull up a chair and a book. We're in for the long haul."

Janine smiled, "Oh I don't mind, I just like feeling helpful. So you must be nearing your due date, how far along are you?" she asked.

"Just about nine months," smiled Phoebe. "My due date is three days away, I can't wait to get this thing out of me!"

"All women get to that stage I think," said Janine.

"Well I just can't wait to see my toes again," said Phoebe. "I mean I'm not particularly fond of toes, or feet in general but I still miss them for some reason."

The two women read through a variety of books looking for useful information for about an hour, while enjoying light conversation until Phoebe stopped talking mid sentance.

"Is everything alright?" asked Janine.

"Yeah," said Phoebe. "I'm just going to be seeing my toes sooner than I thought."

"Did your water just break?" asked Janine standing up.

"Yup," said Phoebe. "Be a doll and go get Paige for me would you?"

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At the Manor, Chris was in the attic going through the Book of Shadows. He flipped through the pages until he found what he was looking for-the page on Phoenixes. Chris read the entry which did not tell him much that he did not already know but as he looked at the distinctive birthmark that was painted on to the page in front of him, identical to the one on Rachel's wrist, he could not stop the niggling feeling in the back of his mind that this was all too familiar to him. He knew that he had seen the symbol before but he had just assumed it had been in the book when he was flicking through it but as he looked at it now he knew that he knew it from somewhere else, but the question was, from where?

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"Well?" asked Kuran as the hired Phoenix shimmered in.

"I've made contact," she said.

"Good, then everything is right on schedule."

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**A/N2:** I am so so so so so so so so so so sorry! I left you guys hanging for way too long and I'm a horrible person. This chapter was a bit all over the place but I was randomly in the mood to write it and once I started I was afraid if I stopped I wouldn't start again so I just kept going and this chapter was the result. I'll reiterate that I refuse to answer any Phoenix related questions, it's a storyline that you will just have to wait and see play out. A lot of you seem to think you have got it sussed out but no one has yet. I'm going to enjoy messing with your minds about it.

OK to my reviewers-I still love you all, I swear and I appreciate all the people that have reviewed within the past months, reminding me about this story! Hope you still are reading.

Thanks to: **Paige Halliwell-Matthews, rcaqua, mjp3, Sparkling Cherries, hazza123, Fallen-Angel, Embry, Maggie0, Samantha, Altaira, Faith-Charmer, bec7012, Kel, ilovedrew88, Icantthinkofafnick, flephanie, Zeria, JadeAlmasy, Little Miss Spell-of-the-Week, Shakai, ****aasdfakljsd , Embry (again-tee hee), BlackKat913, moony391, Nessie** and **GC** -you guys are all awesome!

From now on I am going to do replies in the reply email thing so here are the last posted ones:

**Slayer2b:** Tee hee thanks for both of your reviews-you seem pretty excitable. All those capital letters were pretty intimidating! And yay! Another shippper-I love you guys. Though it is kind of say because I know that in the end one set of shippers are going to be disappointed. I like that you have plans for my story and not to give anything away but in a way one of the things you mentioned sort of happens, but not for a while yet! Thanks again!

**Boo26:** Thanks for reviewing, glad you like the story! Yes, Chris' memories of his old life were erased but in the BttP epilouge it ismentioned that he still vaguely remembers some of them in a fuzzy way. As you can now probably tell that is going to become part of the story soon. Thanks again!


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